Ménage
by Mikkeneko
Summary: A domestic household setting. Ed/Winry, Winry/Scieszka, Ed/Al, Al/Winry, and their various children. Fluff and unconventional living arrangements within.
1. 1 To See Your Smile

It didn't fool Al one bit when his brother tried to sneak into their dorm room long after curfew, but that didn't stop Ed from trying. When the rustling from Ed changing into his sleeping clothes on his side of the room had ceased, Al said mildly, "Welcome back, Brother."

Ed squawked, then groaned sheepishly and reached to turn on the bedside lamp. "Uh, hi, Al," he said, and grinned weakly at his brother.

"So where were you this time?" Al asked, sitting up with a creak.

"Oh, I was at the library," Ed replied glibly. He lay on his back in his bed, putting his arms underneath his head. "Got caught up in things, lost track of time."

Al eyed his brother suspiciously. If he was right... "And which library would this be, Brother?"

"The east -- Central one." Ed stumbled over the name, and Al nodded internally in satisfaction.

"The east branch -- that's the one where Scieszka works, isn't it?" Al asked innocently.

"Oh, does she?" Ed said in a completely unconvincing tone of surprise, studying the nails of his real hand noncholantly.

"You've been spending an awful lot of time there lately," Al observed.

"Umm... well." Ed coughed. "That branch has a lot of the older books, you know, in the Marlith collection in the back, I've found a couple of things that looked like good leads --"

"And what did Scieszka think of those flowers, Brother?" Al interrupted, in a mischevious tone. He was rewarded with a profound blush on Ed's part.

Instead of giving an embarassed groan and hiding his face with his pillow, though, Ed decided to tough it out. He sat up, and tossed Al a confident smirk, trying to work through the blush. "Oh, she thought they were great," he announced. "You shoulda heard her squeak when I showed them to her. I swear she must have gone through half of the _floridae_ genae trying to identify them before I told her I'd put them together myself."

Al nodded, this time with a faint metal clank. He'd helped his brother create those flowers, although Ed had posed it as a theoretical question; he thought they'd come out quite pretty, vivid blue with deep purple centers in a starfish-petal arrangement. It gave him a warm feeling of pride to know that they'd been appreciated. "I'm glad she liked them."

"Yeah, she did." Ed flopped back down, a silly grin overtaking his face. "You shoulda seen her, Al. She's got the most gorgeous smile."

Al studied his brother for a few minutes in silence, and wondered just how far he should push. It's like Mother's smile, he thought, but he didn't say so aloud; Ed wouldn't appreciate the comparison, or the reminder.

It seemed obvious to Al that it was Scieszka's smile, together with her green eyes and brown hair, that had first drawn Ed to her. Al had observed the pattern; starting a month or two ago, whenever they were in Central, Ed had started paying more attention to the quiet librarian, spontaneously transmuting things to give her, doing random favors that wouldn't have occurred to anyone else. It was the same way they had as children competed to make beautiful things for their Mother, just to see her smile.

But it was equally obvious to Al, although Ed seemed to be completely oblivious, that Ed didn't regard Scieszka just as a proxy for their mother. He looked for excuses to hang around her, and came back blushing or with a silly grin on his face. He'd never said anything to Al, nor attempted to ask the girl out on any kind of date. Al ventured, "You like Scieszka a lot, don't you, Brother?"

"Well -- yeah. For a girl, I mean," Ed quickly qualified. "But she's smart. And she's pretty cool, like Winry, except unlike Winry, she doesn't nail me in the head with things. And she knows practically every book in the library inside and out, which can be pretty handy --"

"That's not exactly what I mean," Al interrupted. "You _like_ like her, don't you?"

Ed sputtered. "How exactly is that different?" he demanded. "What, you mean, like... a _girlfriend_ or something? We've got a purpose, Al, in case you'd forgotten, I don't have _time_ for that!"

"But would you?" Al persisted. "If things -- were different, and we didn't have to move around all the time."

"Huh." For a while Ed didn't answer, staring up at the ceiling. Al glanced over, to see him chewing on his lower lip, brows drawn down in thought. At last, when Al thought he'd been ignored, Ed offered, "...would that bother you?"

"No, of course not," Al said firmly. And in a way, it was kind of a relief -- Ed was forced into too many hardships for his sake. To know that he was still capable of the sorts of things that boys their age should be interested in -- girls, dates -- relieved a lot of his concern. "I think it's sweet, Brother!"

"Heh. You would, you sap," Ed snorted, but he seemed vastly relieved. Al felt a little guilty. The way he said it, it sounded like he was being unconditionally supportive and self-sacrificing, and yet... if it were Winry that Ed was showing interest in, Al didn't think he could have voiced such unenthusiastic support. It wasn't like he wanted Winry for _himself,_ it was more like... well, it was more like it would feel unfair, for Ed to get a head start when he couldn't keep up.

"Anyway, it's a purely hypothetical question," Ed said firmly, interrupting Al's vaguely melancholy thoughts. "Scieszka's nice, and all, but I still don't have time for a girlfriend. No girl would want a boyfriend who won't stay in the city for more than a week at a time, anyway. You're still my first priority, Al, and that's just the way it's gotta be."

"Yeah." Al didn't say anything more than that, but the little warm glowy place inside of him seemed to grow a little larger at his brother's words. He lay back down, with a creak and a clank, and reflected on how selfish he actually was; he didn't mind Ed having someone he liked, just so long as Ed stayed by his side.

"'Night, Brother."

"G'night, Al."

Besides, nothing could be all bad that made his brother smile like that.


	2. 2 I Promise You Gold

Uh, wow, how did I never get around to actually publishing this on FFN? "To See Your Smile" was actually only the first in a group of loosely related fanfics I call my "Ménage" universe. The title comes from the French phrase "Ménage a trois," which means "Household of three;" in this case the title simply means "Household."

In short, this is a universe where Ed falls in love with Scieszka, gets her pregnant (the story "The Scientific Method" also falls loosely in this canon) and marries her; but Ed is still in love with Winry, and in fact so is Scieszka... so they end up forming a four-way household to raise their children communally. "I Promise You Gold" is the second fic in this continuity, with "To See Your Smile" being the first.

**Title**: I Promise You Gold  
**Pairing**: Ed+Al, EdxScieszka, ScieszkaxWinry, Al+Winry  
**Warnings**: Light fluff, light sap, light angst... generally light.  
**Category**: Romance  
**Notes**: Prequel to "Ménage."

* * *

"Stop fidgeting," Al said, for what felt like the seventeenth time. "Your tie is crooked."

"Honestly, who came up with something like a bowtie anyway?" Ed complained, tugging at the irritating thing to correct its slant, only of course to end up with it tilting the other way. Al sighed and stepped in to fix it, again. "It's a singularly dumbass invention."

"I don't know," Al said honestly. He glanced at the clock; still an hour to go. Did all of these ceremonies have to be as complex as a twelve-step distillation method? Ed was pacing again, so Al retreated back into the tiny waiting room's only chair. "I think that a lot of formalwear is just a matter of tradition, no matter how silly or impractical it is. I mean, just look at the military uniform's cavalry skirt."

"_Skirt,"_ Ed snickered, but sobered up faster than Al would have liked. "Why is it just guys who have to deal with crap like tuxedos, then?" he complained, and his finger crept up to tug under the collar again. "Girls get all sorts of variety in their dresses, and they look gorgeous. Guys just look dumb."

"You look good, Brother," Al said, simply. Ed did. And he didn't just mean in the tuxedo, although it did set him off quite nicely. But more importantly, Ed was looking better; he'd put back on some of the weight he'd lost, towards the end, and his skin once again lit from within with a healthy glow, not a feverish flush. His hair gleamed brightly gold, not lank and pale like it had been during those terrible weeks they'd spent on the run - chasing it, or being chased, sometimes it was hard to tell. Not a decent night's sleep in all that time, and hardly enough food to keep Ed going - it hadn't been fun, watching Ed drain himself dry in the last desperate sprint from the Stone.

It was all worth it in the end, he agreed now. Now he had his body back, _his_ body, the real flesh and blood one, and he could touch his brother, and see him smile for real, eyes bright and free of guilt for the first time in so many years, and, well - Ed said he'd gotten taller, but Al thought that it was just for the first time, he was carrying himself without all those heavy burdens on his shoulders. Now that they had closed the final distance between them, and could love each other with their own bodies, as their should. It was a long road they'd traveled, a price of years they'd paid for these past couple of months of bliss.

But in the end - in the end. Was this, then, the end? Now that they were free, and safe.

"I'm doomed," Ed said hollowly.

Al sighed, and propped his head on his arm, leaning against the arm of the awkward little chair. "You'll be fine, Brother," he promised him once again.

"I won't be fine. I'm doomed," Ed pronounced. "I'm getting _married._ To Scieszka. Who is pregnant with my child. And I'm _seventeen._ I'm _doomed."_

"You don't have to marry her if you don't feel you're ready," Al pointed out, trying to keep his voice patient and supportive. "Winry would be more than happy to support her _and_ the baby. You know she'll love it like her own kid, and Scieszka too. It's not a good thing to get married out of some sense of obligation, Brother."

"It isn't like that," Ed said hastily. "I mean - I don't feel obliged - I mean, I do, because it's _my kid,_ and I'll cut my other leg off before I abandon it, but I don't _resent _it at all. Besides, Winry would kill me if I made Scieszka sad. It's just - fuck, Al, I'm seventeen!"

"You already said that," Al observed. "Several times."

"Well, I'm _still_ seventeen," Ed quickly said in his defense. "Al, I don't even have a _job_ any more. How am I supposed to support a - a wife and a kid?"

"Scieszka has her own job at the library," Al pointed out. "And besides, Brother, who do you think was taking care of your banking all these years? I know _exactly_ how much you've got tucked away."

"Yes, but that won't last for - it's not -" Ed floundered a bit. "We don't even have a _house,_ Al, where are we supposed to live?"

Al sat up, leaning back in the cramped little chair, and rolled his eyes. "Brother, remember Youswell? You assembled an entire inn from bottom to top in under an hour. I don't think you exactly have to worry about living out on the streets."

"Yes, but -" Ed said, and Al sighed.

"Brother," he said. "Nobody is forcing you to marry her. If you don't want to - if you don't love her - it would only be cruel. You need to be honest with yourself, _and_ with her."

"It's not that -" Ed was pulling on his hair, now, and Al pushed himself out of his chair, took the few steps across the small room, and put his hands on his brother's shoulders. A part of him still marveled that he could _do_ this, that he could touch his brother and feel the give of his flesh, the warmth radiating even through his clothes. That heat sent a spike of longing through his throat; for warmth, closeness, comfort, touch, but he swallowed on it hard. This was his brother's wedding day.

"_Do_ you love her?" Al asked, looking Ed in the eye.

Ed's anguish was plain. "I love _you_, Al," he said, sounding a bit desperate.

Al sighed, again. "I know that, Brother," he said calmly. "I've never forgotten. But that's not what I'm asking. Do you love Scieszka?"

"I do love her!" Ed flailed around a bit. "I do love her, it's just... I love her the same way I love you, Al."

"The same way?" Al pressed him.

"Yes, the same way. Exactly the same way."

"Exactly the same?"

"Well. Almost exactly the same. Slightly different."

"Slightly different how?"

"Well," and Ed blushed slightly, "I don't actively want for Scieszka to push me down on my stomach and -"

"All right, brother!" Al had turned bright red, and flung up one hand to interrupt. "I think I get it."

"It's not that I don't love her," Ed said in a softer tone, lowering his eyes to stare at Al's chest. "But - I didn't expect all this to happen, Al. Back when I - when the two of us slept together -"

"It's all _right,_" Al reminded him again, heading off an impending guilt trip with the ease of long practice. "She was unattached - she didn't get together with Winry until we left - you were unattached - it would have been just stupid to hold out for someone who didn't even have a _body -_ and it was good for both of you."

"-it never occurred to me that she would, you know," Ed finished in a subdued tone. "Get pregnant."

The reply to that was obvious. Too obvious, so Al held his tongue on it. "You had other things on your mind at the time. It's all part of being an adult, Brother; getting married and making a family and... things. It would have happened sooner or later."

"But this was all so sudden," Ed groaned, and his agitation was plain in the way he fidgeted under Al's hands, not wanting to break the contact, but unable to hold still. Without hesitation Al pulled his brother into his arms, and hugged him tight. Ed's arms wrapped around him equally fierce.

"I just thought -" Ed started to pull back, then apparently changed his mind and buried his face deeper against Al's neck. "I thought we'd have more _time_, Al. To rest and - and get used to things, and teach you about your body again, and catch up on everything we missed."

Al had to squeeze his eyes shut against another spike of melancholy. He was happy for Ed, he really was, he really _was_ - it was just -

"I don't want to lose you," Ed said, muffled against his neck, and for a moment Al couldn't make his voice work.

"It can't be helped," he murmured at last, sadly. "It's just called growing up. It's a kind of equivalent trade, too. You give up childish things, and you get adult things in exchange."

"Am I being greedy like a kid, then?" Ed's voice wavered, but he sounded serious all the same. "I don't _want_ to give you up, not even - not even if it means getting Scieszka and the - and the baby. I want to have everything - you, Scieszka, the baby, and Winry, and place where we can call home - and -"

Al couldn't help himself. He laughed. "That would be a pretty strange home, Brother," he said, somewhat shakily. "You and your brother-boyfriend and your wife and your wife's girlfriend." It still lightened the mood enough that he could let go, pull back enough to look his brother in the eye, and pretend he didn't notice how much Ed was blinking. Older brothers didn't cry, after all, and grown men didn't either, and his brother was both.

"We can have two beds in the bedroom," Ed suggested jokingly, tipping his head back and flashing his brother a smile. "That way anyone can switch off, and not have to worry about waking other people up in the morning."

"I don't know, Brother," Al said flippantly. "Maybe Winry and I would want a bedroom of our own. You snore, after all."

"I do _not,_" Ed began indignantly, then did a double take. "You and Winry? Al, still? She turned down your proposal, remember?"

"We were _six,"_ Al reminded him. "But she's still - Oh, I'm not going to argue with you _now,_ Brother. But we _did_ talk about it, right after I got back."

"You talked about it?" Ed seemed faintly offended, that his brother and near-sister had gone behind his back, even about something like this. "And what?"

"And we decided that since there was you and me, and there was her and Scieszka, that we could just be friends." Sadness tugged at the corner of Al's thoughts again, but he resolutely pushed it back. Right now Ed needed him to be cheerful and supportive. The battle might be with rings and vows instead of chimera and homunculi, but his brother still needed him to watch his back, and so long as that was so, Al would be there.

Out in the chapel, the music switched from a pleasant background to a stunning organ cascade. Al shot a quick glance at the clock - how _had_ he lost track of time? and his hands patted frantically over Ed's tuxedo, making sure everything was straight. "Time to go, Brother!" he said urgently. Ed gulped, and nodded, putting on a face as determined as his namesake.

Al stepped back, feeling oddly lost, but Ed grabbed his hand before he could retreat out of range. "Al," he said, voice pleading. "You'll stay - afterwards, won't you? At least for a little while, until we get settled. Stay with me, please?"

Al blinked, and then let himself smile. "Of course, Brother," he said. "I'll stay with you as long as I can." He hesitated, then added, in a low voice, "I never want to be-"

The rest of his words were cut off in a blast of organ music as the door to the chapel swung open to reveal the church, gorgeously filled with light and flowers, family and guests. And there at the other set of doors into the chapel was Scieszka, glowing brilliantly in her white and gold dress, flanked by Winry.

Ed swallowed - Al watched his throat work - took a deep breath, and stepped out onto the carpet. His spine was stiff as a rod, as he made his way down the aisles of guests to the front of the chapel, his best man walking just beside and behind him.

All the way to the altar, he never let go of his brother's hand.

* * *

~to be continued.

___  
"Believe you can shine like you're silver  
And I promise you gold, I promise you gold  
And whenever you're dark inside  
Don't let go; don't let go  
And remember I love you the same  
And I'll strangle your pain,"  
And he tells me to sing so I sing  
so I sing for my brother who keeps me sane  
and tells me everything will be  
okay._


	3. 3 Ménage

**Title**: Ménage  
**Pairing**: Al/Winry/Ed/Scieszka  
**Category**: Fluff  
**Warning**: Fluff, sap, chibis, foursome, yaoi, yuri, het, domesticity, angst  
**Author's Notes**: Third part of the Ménage series.

* * *

The first rays of dawn were just peeking in through the east-facing windows of the kitchen when Al padded in, sleepy-eyed, from the bedroom.

He suppressed a yawn, wincing in the clear light, and went to pour himself a kettle full of water, and put it on the stove to boil. There was - he squinted into the crockery pot - still tea left, and satisfied that he wouldn't have to suffer any ordeals this morning, he leaned against the edge of the counter, waiting for the water to boil.

This early, and without caffeine, he found his thoughts moving at a slow pace, with occasional soft fades between moments of consciousness. He didn't mind. The kitchen was a little chilly, the floor cold against his bare feet, but the stove radiated heat, and early morning sunlight slanted in through the windows. He heard the faint chirp of birdsong, quickly overwhelmed by the rising whistle of the kettle.

It was just him, and the cool morning air and the kitchen and his tea, and as much as he loved his family, Alphonse Elric wouldn't have traded these moments alone for anything. He smiled as he picked up the kettle and poured himself a mug of tea, quickly setting it back down on the stove to stay hot while he steeped and drank the first cup.

The hot tea woke up his mouth and his stomach, and after a few minutes the caffeine began to wake up the rest of him. He glanced up at the softly ticking clock; quarter to six. At least half an hour before he had to start making breakfast, he calculated, and went back to communing with his tea in peace.

Around six o'clock he heard a stumbling thump in the hallway, and smiled around his tea. He got up to turn the heat up on the kettle again, and to get out a mug and the coffee for Winry.

However, it wasn't a grumpy young blond woman who stumbled into the kitchen, but a yawning, bleary-eyed little boy. The cause of the stumbling was easily explained; the boy was dragging his blanket around with him, wrapped around his neck, and it kept catching on things and pulling them over.

"Terry?" he said with some surprise, setting the kettle back down again. "What are you doing up at this hour?" A quick glance showed he hadn't lost track of things; it was still only a little after six.

"Papa?" The word was interrupted by another yawn, and Terry pulled the blanket over his shoulder.

"Something wake you up, squirt?" Al smiled, crouching down in front of the boy and ruffling his hair.

"Whacking blue dragon," Terry said plainly.

"Huh?" Al blinked at the kid. Okay, that was a little inexplicable, even at this hour of the morning. "Did you have a bad dream?" he asked, brow furrowing with worry.

"Uh-uh," Terry said, shaking his head. His messy brown hair tumbled into sleepy golden eyes, and Al smiled as he smoothed it back again. Terry folded back the blanket to reveal an armful of stripey black and grey kitten. Its cover blown, the kitten immediately began to purr noisily.

Al laughed, and reached out to take the cat from the little boy's arms. "I see," he said. "Zebby, you silly kit, if you want to be fed, come and find me, don't bother the kids. They can't feed you anyway."

After petting for a moment, he put it aside, and turned back to Terry. "You should probably go back to bed," he said, "or your mama will worry, won't she?"

Terry nodded, covering another yawn. His eyes were closing sleepily, and he swayed on his feet. Smiling, Al picked him up, draping the blanket over his own shoulder for safe carrying. He immediately stumbled and had to bite back a curse; Zebby had an unerring instinct for getting under the feet of anyone trying to carry things.

With a lot of foot-shuffling and whispered words that barely managed to stay in the civil range of things, Al managed to maneuver Terry back to his bedroom and tucked him back in. He dropped the blanket back over Terry, nudging one corner towards the boy's hand until in his sleep he registered its presence and grabbed.

Al straightened up, nearly tripped over the kitten again, and had to make a quick grab to scoop her up before she could jump back onto the child's bed and wake him up again. "Oh, no you don't," he muttered. "You're coming with me. I guess I'd better feed you, or you'll roust them all out of bed, and I'll have a kitchen full of kids. Ah, for such a small cat, you're such a lot of trouble."

Still talking softly to the kitten, he made his way back to the kitchen, where he dropped Zebby onto the floor and began poking through the cupboards for the cat food. When the proper food-noises were being made, Zebby seemed in no hurry to bother the kids; the other cats also came peeling in from wherever they'd been sleeping in the house. Two more cats, one black and one rusty brown; at least one unaccounted for, either outside or too lazy to get up for breakfast. Al left another bowl for him.

A tick-tacking of nails on the floor heralded the arrival Erwin, the brown-and-white German shepherd who spent the night sleeping in the yard. The cats all gave him disdainful glares, but kept on eating; they knew Erwin wasn't allowed to chase them indoors. Mealtimes were cease-fires on all fronts. After gulping down his food, Erwin came and sat by the front door; bracing himself for the shock of cold morning air; Al let him out for his morning exercise. One of the many nice things about living out in the country again, Al thought, was that he could let their pets loose without a leas and not have to worry about the neighbors complaining.

Pets fed, Al glanced at the clock and decided it was time to start feeding people. The kids would sleep a while longer, but_some_ people had to think about getting up for work. He got out the frying pan with vague thoughts of pancakes, but when he went to look, they were low on flour, so he switched to eggs instead. Someone would have to go shopping soon, he noted, and began marshaling excuses why it wouldn't be him. There were some advantages to staying on top of things, namely that you had a head start on getting out of the way.

Eggs were frying busily in the skillet when Winry stumbled in, bumping against the doorframe on her way in as per usual. Al smiled, and carefully stayed turned towards the stove so she wouldn't see; there was a reason he'd expected early morning crashing noises to be followed by her.

"Good morning, Winry," he said with humor as she flopped down at the table.

"Morning," Winry grunted in return. "Don't see what's good about it."

"Eggs and sausage," Al said promptly, maneuvering a fork under one of the yolks so he could flip them. The delicious smell of cooking eggs floated out from the pan, and Al had designs on the cold sausage lying in wait for their turn. He stole a nibble from the end of one, not minding that it was cold, not minding at all. He could _feel_ that it was cold, he could taste the salty flavor on his tongue, he could smell the eggs in the pan, feel the heat wafting up to strike him in the face.

It had been eight years and these things still never ceased to amaze him. Although they usually made sure that chores and labor were divided up equally, Alphonse always ended up making breakfast for them all.

"Sausage," Winry said, coming up to peer over his shoulder. "Bacon?" she said hopefully.

Al shook his head regretfully. "Sorry, it's frozen," he said. "I can thaw some out for you, if you really want it," he offered.

"Nah." Winry draped herself over his shoulders, and yawned in his ear. He wrinkled his nose at the smell of her morning breath, not overpowering but not fun either, but couldn't keep from smiling. He shrugged back a little, not to push her away but to tuck himself under her arms more tightly, and could feel her amused humm vibrating through his collarbone as she settled her chin on his shoulder and watched the eggs cook.

Footsteps sounded in the kitchen doorway, and Winry lit up, untangling herself from Al and turning around as Scieszka appeared in the doorway. "Good morning, Winry, Al," she said, the last word ending on a squeak as she valiantly repressed a yawn.

"Morning, Scieszka," Winry said happily, and went over to wind her arms around the brunette's neck. Morning breath obviously did not bother Scieszka, Al thought as he watched them exchange a deep, lingering good-morning kiss. He grinned to himself, and looked back at his eggs. The first panful were done, so he flipped them out onto a plate and set it on the counter, tipping the first batches of sausages into the pan instead. Winry came over and snagged the plate, eating the first egg with her bare hands, while Scieszka went to get plates and forks.

"Do you have any orders to fill today, Winry?" Scieszka asked as she set the table. Winry nodded, mouth too full to talk, but she carried the plate over to the table.

"Uh-huh, a few. Mostly just working on old projects," Winry said around her eggs. "Won't even have to open until noon. What about you?"

"Oh..." Scieszka waved a napkin around, nearly knocking off her glasses with it. "Some bookkeeping that has to be done, but I don't need to go into the office for that, I can just copy it down here."

"That's good," Al said. He turned the sausages over. "Say, what do you think about a picnic lunch? It looks like it's going to be a beautiful day. We can take the kids out, and when you have to go open the shop, Winry, we'll keep them out from underfoot."

"Today?" Scieszka made dubious noises. "Isn't your teacher supposed to come and visit tomorrow? Maybe we should hold off and have the picnic then instead."

"No reason we can't do both," Winry replied.

They made small talk like that, keeping their voices hushed with the ease of long practice; Winry and Scieszka kept most of the conversation going while Al kept part of his attention constantly on the food, and part of his attention listening for noises from the bedroom. Even when Winry and Scieszka were full, he kept on comfortably cooking, building up piles of sausages and eggs for the hungry mouths to come.

Sure enough, at a quarter to eight there was a thump and then a crash from the bedroom, like the noise of someone falling heavily out of a bed and dumping over the nightstand on the way down. Al smiled again, and bit down on his own share of the eggs.

Ed staggered in before too long, with his usual zombie-face on. He stopped in the middle of the kitchen and looked around at the three of them, with a bleary squint.

"Well, it's about time you're up," Scieszka told him cheekily. "We were beginning to wonder if you were going to sleep in like the other children."

Ed blinked at her, then narrowed his eyes. He tromped over to the breakfast table - whatever grace he might normally posses was completely absent at this hour of the morning - and pounced on Scieszka, sending her chair tipping back precariously as he dove down and kissed her thoroughly, aggressively, and with great attention to detail.

She was laughing breathlessly when he let her up for air, grabbing onto his shoulder to keep her chair from tipping the rest of the way over, glasses askew. "_Not_ one of the kids," he proclaimed smugly.

Even Winry was giggling by that time. Al waved his spatula at them. "Why don't I get a good-morning greeting like that?" he said.

"I don't _want_ a good morning greeting like that," Winry was quick to put in, when Ed focused on her next in line.

"Didn't offer, your morning breath stinks," Ed said, and stifled a yawn. Then he licked his lips and sniffed. "Sausages. I taste sausages. And eggs. Where are they?"

"_Here,_ brother," Al said with some exasperation. "Honestly, you're useless in the morning."

And then the kitchen was filled with giggling that was much too high-pitched to have come from Scieszka _or_ Winry. They looked over to see two shining blond heads, two sets of hazel eyes, and two identical I-caught-Mama-and-Papa-doing-something-naughty grins.

Al and Winry exchanged a look, and sighed simultaneously as Scieszka jumped to her feet, blushing. "What are you two doing up so early?" she exclaimed, as she went over to scoop up the smaller of the blonds and ushered the other towards the table. "Especially you, Sara! Did you get your little sister out of bed, Peter? And where's your brother?"

"Big Brother's still sleeping," Sara lisped. Scieszka settled the two-year old down in her high chair, and levered the older-by-a-year Peter into the booster chair beside her.

"Zebby woke him up," Peter informed her seriously, "so he went back to sleep again."

Al raised an eyebrow. "And how would you know what it was that woke Terry up early, Peter?" he asked the boy dryly. "You wouldn't happen to know how Zebby got into his room so early in the morning, would you?"

Peter looked absolutely chagrined, and Sara burst into shrieks of laughter again. "Papa knows, Peter!" she cried, jabbing him in the arm. "I told you he would!"

"That's because your papa is smart," Ed said, and he reached over to ruffle Peter's honey-gold hair. "We have magical see-through-walls powers, didn't you know?"

Peter sank down until his nose was beneath the level of the table. Scieszka laughed. "Should I go get Terry?" she asked of nobody in particular. "I'm sure he can't have slept through this racket..."

"I'll go get him up," Winry replied, getting up from the table. "You just get some food into these two before they get up to even more trouble."

* * *

With kitchen, dishes, and kids all cleaned of breakfast and drying, Ed and Winry had disappeared into the den, and Al found himself on the living room couch with one of his notebooks and a mug of tea, and a cat of three to keep him company. Outside, Al could hear the muffled shrieks of laughter, and frequent, joyful barks. The noises faded or grew louder as the kids ran around and around in the house, or maybe ran down to the road. Al couldn't keep the smile off his face, hiding it behind his mug as he devoted himself to his book. No doubt eventually one of them would come running inside in tears or stormy angry, with a "she hit me" or "he won't play fair," but he would deal with that when the time came.

Across the room from him, Scieszka had settled herself in, with a newspaper and a pad of paper that looked like it had come out of the laboratory. As Al watched, she folded the paper aside and pulled the pad in front of her, bending close to it as she began to write.

"A letter to your mother?" Al asked conversationally. Scieszka looked up at him in some surprise, then smiled and nodded.

"Yes," she said. "It's been a few weeks, so I thought it was time to let her know how things were going. I thought she'd like to hear about Terry starting school." She frowned at the paper, a slight hint of melancholy creeping into her expression.

Al let his voice gentle, tempered by sympathy. "Did you ever get a response back to your last letter?" he asked gently. He was pretty sure she never had; he was usually the one to sort through the mail, after all.

Business letters - letters from Central, or from the military, which Ed always ordered him in an annoyed voice to burn, but he always made sure to check them first for anything important. Letters for Winry, from customers or other engineers asking technical mechanical questions as obscure as any of the similar queries that came for Al from his research counterparts at the University. Scieszka didn't get much business mail - it mostly ended up sent to her shop - so everything addressed to her, or to Ed, was usually personal. Al would have remembered a letter that was addressed from her mother.

Scieszka sighed, shoulders rising and falling. "No," she said sadly, and flipped the sheet of paper over. "I was hoping she would answer this time, but she didn't."

"I'm sorry," Al said quietly, and Scieszka shrugged a little, starting to write again.

"I'm not," she said. "I mean, I am. I wish she could just accept us - accept me this way. But I won't regret my family, not even for her."

"She's still your family," Al pointed out seriously. "She's your mother. She shouldn't shut you out like this. Not if it means shutting out her own grandchild."

"Until she's willing to accept _all_ of her grandchildren, it doesn't matter," Scieszka replied. She toyed with her pencil, expression abstracted. "You know, sometimes I envy you guys. It's almost - easier. You don't have to worry about what your mother thinks of your living situation."

Al's first reaction to that was a strong denial. It was much better to have a live mother, than a dead one, even if that mother was estranged. But then he thought about it some more. What would he and Ed have done if their mother had turned away from them, horrified or revolted by the love they had built for themselves, for each other? What would he do if his mother was alive, but denied her sons?

The seconds were ticking by, and Al shook himself out of his thoughts. "I'm sorry," he said again, painfully aware of how little he could say that would really help Scieszka. When it came down to it, Scieszka chose her family and her children over her mother. But he wished she didn't have to make that choice. "I really am."

"And I said, I'm not." Scieszka was back to writing, her expression calm and determined once more. "This is where I belong. Sooner or later, she'll have to accept that."

Al hoped that was the case. He hoped even more devoutly that Scieszka and her mother would be reconciled before her mother's illness carried her away from her daughter entirely. That would be the worst of all fates, he thought; to have your mother die, knowing to the last moment that you could never make things right between them. He found himself standing, and crossing to stand behind Scieszka, laying his hands on her shoulders. She turned her head and smiled up at him, as he rubbed lightly, offering what comfort he could.

It was a beautiful smile, and Al understood why his brother could be so entranced by it. It was the smile of a person with a sweet and giving heart, a person who wasn't afraid to give love or accept it, in any form. He leaned forward and pressed his chest to her back, wrapping his arms around her and settling his hands over hers.

"Don't forget to write about Ed's last disastrous cooking attempt," he murmured in her ear. She giggled a little at the memory, shoulders shaking under her arms, and moved their hands to write some more.

* * *

Tranquility never lasted long in the Elric household. Al had been aware, in the back of his mind, of Ed and Winry talking in the study, but it wasn't until their voices began to rise with frustration and annoyance that it really caught his attention. He met Scieszka's eyes, and she made a face that exactly reflected his own feelings. Just as well the kids were entertaining themselves outside, not that they hadn't seen _this_ show played over a hundred times already.

"Edward, you overbearing ass!" Winry shouted, and a moment later she burst through the door and stalked into the living room, eyes glowing with fury. Al made sure to keep himself harmless and out of the way of her wrath, because in just a minute - ah. Here came Edward, fuming and annoyed, though not in a true temper just yet.

"What? What exactly is the problem?" he yelled at Winry's back, and she whirled around to face him. "It doesn't matter _who_ her father is, she's still an Elric. El-ric, you understand?"

"She's also _my daughter,_ you chauvinistic prick!" Winry yelled back. "Who's to say she's not a Rockbell, too? Why should it always be the male name that gets attached to the kid, like she's some kind of property of yours?"

"What, so she should be property of yours instead?" Ed snapped back. "You aren't pitching a fit about how Peter gets enrolled into the stupid school!"

Scieszka caught Al's gaze, and rolled her eyes in a meaningful way. Al had to smother a laugh; he was almost tempted to tell the two of them to get a room, before they got wound up enough to jump each other. Still, Winry didn't seem to be - Ah. Here came 'deadly projectiles' mode.

She groped behind her on the bookshelf and grabbed a hardcover tome - Al winced, recognizing one of his theology textbooks - and flung it with devastating accuracy at Edward's head. "Don't even try to change the subject!"

Ed snatched it out of the air six inches in front of his face and slammed it down on the table beside him. "I am _not _changing the subject, you're just being hysterical! If he's an Elric then so is she! D'you want them to grow up thinking they're not brother and sister?"

"_I am not being hysterical!"_ This time Winry flung one of her wrenches at him with deadly force; he had to duck a little and deflect it with his forearm. Scieszka jumped a little as it thumped on the table next to her, and Al scowled at it. This was really too much. "It was my _mother's_ name, and you don't even _care,_ because you're a -"

"-An insensitive prick," Al interrupted, standing suddenly from the couch and sliding the mantelpiece clock out of Winry's reach before she could grab it to throw, "an overbearing ass, a chauvinistic idiot, and an immature jerk, we know all this, Winry, but please don't destroy the house trying to beat sense into his head."

"_Hey,"_ Ed objected heatedly. "Whose side are you on, anyway?"

"Actually, I'm afraid I'm with Brother here," Al said, and the apologetic tone couldn't really conceal the quiet resolution behind it. "It wouldn't feel right for our children to be separated by different names. Not everyone would understand."

"Argh!" Winry threw up her hands in exasperation. "I should have known you'd take his side!"

"Hey, look, just because you're..." Ed started to say, before he was interrupted.

Scieszka coughed, fiddling with her glasses. "Please, you two, settle down," she said in a small voice. "Terry's just now enrolled for this fall, it'll be two more years before we even have to sign Peter up. We don't have to decide anything just now."

"Oh, you!" Winry whirled on Scieszka, scowling fiercely. "You don't _have_ to let them walk all over you, you know!"

Scieszka could only smile helplessly, and shake her head, because she really had no idea how to explain it to Winry. "Winry..."

"You can stand up for yourself once in a while!" Winry shook her head fiercely, blond hair flying everywhere. "It won't kill you!"

Scieszka sighed. "Winry, it isn't like that," she said quietly, stepping forward and gathering Winry's wrists in her hands. The blonde stilled, face lowering, set in a stubborn scowl, but she didn't pull back.

Scieszka caught Al's eye for a moment, pleading, and he nodded firmly. Taking a firm grip on his brother's jacket, he dragged them out of the room, planting them in the den and swinging the door shut.

"She's being unreasonable," Ed grumbled, wriggling free of Al's grip. "It's just a name, damn it, why's she making out like it's a matter of national security?"

Al sighed, and sat down on the den couch, wishing he'd brought his notebook with him. They'd probably be confined to this room until Winry calmed down, or the kids came in demanding lunch, whichever came first. "I agree with you about the names, Brother, but still," he said, "you shouldn't take Winry's feelings so lightly."

"I'm not _trying_ to take them lightly," Ed said irritably. "I just don't see what the big deal is. She wanted to name her daughter after her mother, well, she _did._ If she wants, we can even put down her name as Sara Rockbell Elric, just so long as she's honestly an _Elric. _What more does there need to be?"

"It isn't just that," Al replied. "It's that - Well, you know that Winry doesn't have any siblings, and since Auntie Pinako passed away, well... she's the only Rockbell around now. She wants to continue a tradition of Rockbell women in Risembourg, to carry on her grandmother's business."

"Oh." Ed sat down on the couch next to his brother, the annoyed scowl smoothed out by a look of concern, though a hard line stayed between his eyes. "But how does she even know that Sara will want to be an automail engineer when she grows up? Maybe she'll want to be a librarian, or a merchant, or a schoolteacher, or a, or a..."

Al sighed again. "She doesn't, but that's not the point," he said. "It's just the way she feels that's important."

"I guess you're right." Ed tilted his head back, to stare at the ceiling. "Jeez, you'd think that knowing her all my life, and living with her for the last five years, I'd understand the way she thinks, but _no."_

"As long as one of us understands, Brother," Al said mildly, and Ed turned his head to grin at him.

"Well, as long as I've got you around, Al, I'll be fine."

Al tilted his head to the side, letting his humor surface. "And what do I get in exchange for being your interpreter, Brother?" he inquired casually.

"Ho?" Ed's grin widened, and he pushed himself off his position on the couch, turning over to climb onto Al's lap, resting his arms on the couch back on either side of the young man. Al smiled and raised his hands to settle on either side of Ed's hips. "Did you have something in mind, Al?" Ed whispered.

"Well, for a start," Al stated, rubbing a thumb along the seam of Ed's pocket, "I never did get my good-morning kiss."

"It's still morning..."

They hadn't gotten more than a few seconds, however, before the familiar giggle interrupted them. Ed froze, and Al groaned, letting his head thump back against the back of the couch. "Why am I not surprised?" he muttered. Ed buried his face in Al's shoulder, wrapping his arms over his head as if to hide himself.

Sara and Terry were hanging onto the edge of the door; Terry looked perfectly serious as usual, but it was Sara who was giggling, with the all-too familiar "I-caught-Mama-and-Papa-doing-something-naughty" grin on her face. "Sara, go help your mother," Edward said, his voice somewhat muffled by Al's shirt.

"I already _did," _Sara said. "She said to go play with Papa Al, because Mama and Mama needed some alone together time."

"Oh yeah?" Ed lifted his head and yelled through the open door. "Well, maybe Papa and Papa need some alone together time too, did you think of that?"

A faint laugh came from farther into the house, and Ed groaned, dropping his head back against Al's shoulder. "She's still mad," he muttered. "She definitely did that on purpose..."

"You're paranoid, Brother," Al told him, but sighed, and pushed Ed over to flop in an ungraceful heap onto the couch beside him. "But probably right."

* * *

"Papa," Terry said later that afternoon, leaning over the arm of the couch with his arms folded. "What does Mama Scieszka do for work?"

"Huh?" Ed looked up from his text, and at the boy through his glasses. "Why do you ask?" he said curiously.

A little shrug, a little foot-shuffling. "Amery asked," he said, referring to the daughter of the family that lived a few miles down the road. They met occasionally, when their families ranged far enough afield, and Winry had high hopes that they would become friends. "Her papa is a lawyer. She wanted to know what my mama and papa did for work, and I told her my mama makes automail, but I realized I don't know about Mama Scieszka."

"Oh. Well. Your mama co-owns a used bookstore in town," Ed told him. "Together with Mr. Ravi, they buy old books from people who don't want them any more, and sell them to new people who do."

Terry was silent for a moment, perhaps boggling over the concept of a book that someone wouldn't want any more. "Mama Scieszka is a bookstore-worker?" he said in a questioning tone.

"Well, she owns half of it, but yeah, she does work there during the week." Ed smiled. "She works very hard to keep it going."

Terry considered this for another moment, then asked, "What does Papa Al do for work?" Through the door into the laboratory, Al looked up to hear his name mentioned, but when there was no immediate call on his attention, he returned to work.

Now Ed grinned outright, a combination of amusement and older-brother pride. "He works in research and the development of alchemical theory. Important people at Central University sends him questions and problems, and he figures them out, and sends the answers back."

"Oh," Terry seemed vastly impressed by this. "Papa Al is an important person?" he asked in an awed voice.

Ed chuckled, shooting a glance through the doorway at the lab. Al was studiously keeping his eyes on his work, but his cheeks were turning red. "Yes, that's right. Papa Al is a very important person, and a very smart person, too, no matter what he might say about it."

Terry nodded, golden eyes wide. "What about you, Papa?" he asked. "What do you do for work?"

Here Ed stumbled, awkwardly. Al looked up again, listening with interest. "Oh, well," Ed said awkwardly. "Right now I'm not really - I mean, I used to be a National Al - I don't do that any more, but a few years ago, I worked for the mili -" He bit his tongue at the look of incomprehension on his son's face. What did National Alchemists or the military have to do with this little boy? Nothing, if Ed had anything to say about it, and he did. He met Al's eyes, through the doorway, and his brother gave a quick shake of his head. Yeah. Maybe someday, he'd explain everything. But not today.

He sighed, and held out a hand to beckon Terry up onto the couch with him. After a moment's hesitation, the boy did, and Ed pulled him close and put an arm around him. Terry tolerated the cuddling patiently. "Well, right now I take care of you guys," he said with a trace of wry humor in his voice. "And, um, I help your mothers and your father a little with their work, even though I don't get paid for it. And I do stuff around the house."

Terry nodded. "Amery's mother does that, too," he said, drawing conclusions to himself. Then he looked up at Ed. "Papa, does that mean you're a housewife?" he asked seriously.

Ed choked, eyes bulging as he stared at his son. In the laboratory, Al started laughing so hard he fell over his workbench.

* * *

Ed remained in a bad mood from the incident all afternoon, especially as Winry came in to see what the fuss was, and once Al had explained the matter to her, she too laughed herself sick at Ed's expense. He set himself stoically to ignore it, but once Scieszka got home, Winry of course regaled her with the whole story, and he had to put up with _two_ sets of girlish giggling, not to mention the little grin on his brother's face he could _feel_ even when he wasn't looking.

The worst part, Ed thought moodily, was that there wasn't even anything he could really do to distract himself, no projects he could work on or immediate research that he could bury himself in to prove the assertion wrong. With the kids down for their afternoon nap, he couldn't even really absorb himself in caring for or playing with one of them. He picked up his discarded book instead and moved to the den, barricading himself around with some of his old favorites and glaring angrily at anyone who tried to interrupt.

So he was a little between jobs right now. So what? With their three incomes together, not to mention Ed's savings and pension, they were hardly hurting for money. If they were, he'd have figured something out, but they _weren't, _and somebody had to be at home all the time to take care of the kids, anyway. True, Al mostly worked at home, and Winry's shop was nearby, but Ed understood better than most what it meant to a child to have someone there and available _all_ the time.

And after all the hell he'd been through in his teenage years, he damn well thought he'd earned a break. Admittedly, he'd never really given a thought during that time as to what he'd do _afterwards,_ but continuing to work for the military was obviously out of the question, and for someone of his... somewhat unusual employment history and dubious fame, there wasn't much else work available for an ex-dog of the military.

Or rather, there _was,_ but none of it suitable for a husband and father. Ed scowled at the page in front of him. Those damn letters -

"Ed, we're out of butter," Winry announced, poking her head in the door. "And flour, and cheese, and Peter's cookies, so somebody has to go shopping. Oh, and Scieszka was thinking of making meatloaf for dinner tonight, so also pick up -"

Ed came up from behind his book-barrier with a snarl. "Why do I have to go?" he demanded. "I went last time, and the time before that, and to lug back your shipment of machine oil, too. Send Al, or go yourself."

"Al's busy," Winry informed him, "and I spent all day in the shop, while you've just been lounging around on the couch. There should still be money on the dining room table, so get going."

"I have not been lounging!" Ed snarled, clutching his book defensively. "I've been doing research."

"Sure, Ed," Winry snorted as she left back into the living room. Her next sentence was a bit jumbled, but one word drifted back to him: "...housewife..."

"_I am not a housewife!"_ Ed howled, with as much fury as he had ever reserved for the word "short." He stormed out of the den into the living room, glaring after Winry, who didn't even stop laughing. "The Fullmetal Alchemist is not a housewife, dammit!"

"Ed!" Al reproached him, jerking his head towards the bedroom where the kids lay napping. Ed controlled his volume with an effort, though it didn't abate his ire. "No matter what you call it, Brother, the fact remains that you're the one who doesn't have a job. It won't hurt you to help out around the house, you know."

"It isn't my fault that I don't have a job!" Ed exclaimed, turning on his brother. "Nobody wants to hire an ex-dog of the military, and you already _know_ I can't work for the University like you do -"

Al sighed. "Brother, we're not going to have this argument again right now," he said wearily. "Even so -"

"Even so, there are still things you could do," Scieszka spoke up, coming in to see what all the noise was. He glared, but didn't interrupt her. "It would do you good to get out of the house, Edward. You don't have to - but don't you think it would be good to try?"

"It isn't good for you to do nothing but sit around all day," Al added. "You weren't meant to sit still for this long, Brother. You know we love you, but sooner or later not doing anything'll drive you crazy."

"And drive the rest of us crazy in the meantime," Winry said, rolling her eyes. "Seriously, Ed. You're climbing the walls, around here."

"I never said I wasn't _willing_ to work!" Ed exclaimed, turning from one of his lovers to the other with indignant rage. "But there's nothing I _can_ do!"

"Even for the ex-military, there are still plenty of people that would fall all over themselves to accept your help, Brother," Al said. "What about that article in the newspaper, the one you were going on and on about last week? The one about the new railway they're laying to West City, for the trains with the new engines?"

"Yes, those!" Winry was nodding vigorously. "Wouldn't you love to be a part of that project, Ed? It would be like making history!"

"Winry, you know I can't do that," Ed protested. "I would have to go on-site - at least to Central - for God knows how long at a time -"

Winry and Scieszka exchanged a glance, and somehow that made Ed's temper flare any further, to see them forming an alliance between them. "It would be good for you, Edward," Scieszka said encouragingly, and Winry added, "It's not like we'll curl up and die if you leave for a while, Ed. We'll manage fine -"

**"YOU WANT ME TO JUST UP AND ABANDON MY KIDS?"** Ed exploded into a full rage. **"WHAT KIND OF WORTHLESS FATHER DO YOU THINK I AM?"**

Winry and Scieszka fell silent, aghast. They'd seen Ed annoyed, and grumpy, and cranky, and irritated, and even angry, but this kind of towering fury was not something they had seen very often. Ed was trembling from head to foot, hands held out to the side, restrained by sheer force of will from breaking something, and his eyes were wild. Al immediately got up from his seat, crossed the room, and put his hands on Ed's shoulders. "Brother," he said, cautionary.

"I _won't_ abandon them," Ed said, rounding on Al, shrugging his hands off. "No matter what. No matter how good the reason sounds at the time, d'you think they'd _understand?_ Why their father is gone and wont' come back? D'you think they'd forgive that, for anything?"

"Brother!" Al grabbed Ed's shoulders more firmly, glad that he was still the bigger of the two, and shaking him once. It served to get Ed's attention focused on him, at least. "None of us are Mother," he reminded him. "We won't get sick and die if you leave us. And none of us are alone."

Ed took a deep breath and let it out, making a visible effort to calm down. He lowered his head, and unclenched his fists. "I won't leave," he muttered. "No matter how good the reason seems. I'll stay."

A noise from the far wall made them look over; a couple of blond heads were peering around the doorframe, eyes wide and frightened. Without a word, Winry went over to take charge of the children, herd them back into their rooms.

"Edward," Scieszka put in softly, concerned. "I - I can understand your feelings, but you can't throw away your whole life for the sake of staying in one place -"

Ed interrupted her with a fierce shake of his head. "This place _is_ my life," he said, tone low, but equally intense. "This house and the people in it."

"This house is too small a world to contain you, Brother," Al said quietly. "We won't smother you, or let you stifle yourself for our sakes. _I_ won't let you do that. Not any more."

"I won't leave," Ed repeated, faintly. Al sighed, and pulled his brother into his arms, hugging him fiercely.

"You will leave," he pronounced with certainty, "one day, you'll leave. But you'll come back again. No matter what, you'll come back again, and we'll be waiting for you."

* * *

The knock came in the middle of the afternoon, and Ed was at first inclined to ignore it. He was in the middle of a _very_ good passage, after all, and it couldn't be that - "Someone get that!" he called irritably as the knocking continued. In fact, it was getting louder, harsher.

"I can't leave the stove," Al called in from the kitchen, and "I'm busy!" Winry yelled from the workshop. Scieszka didn't even answer, and Ed growled as he thought she must be too engrossed in her own book to even register the disturbance. The knocking only continued, until the door was rattling in its frame, and Ed flung aside his book with a muttered curse, levering himself off the couch. Erwin rose from his corner and stalked over to Ed's side, growling softly at the intruder.

Flanked by Erwin, Ed stalked over to the door. He hadn't even gotten a chance to look through the small window - whose idea had been to put it _there_ in the door, anyway? - when a sharp clap and crackling noise alerted him as to who exactly was on the other side of that door, and that he'd better not delay in getting it open.

He yanked the front door open just before Izumi could transmute it. "What are you doing here?" he snarled up at her. "You said you weren't coming until tomorrow!"

"I'll come when I want to come, you punk, now get your manners screwed in and invite us in," Izumi snarled back. She pushed forward - Ed knew better than to try and stop her - and nodded a greeting at Sig as he followed his wife through the door, grunting a hello.

Erwin crept forward, snarling, ready to defend his home against the intruders - until Izumi stopped short and glared down at him. The snarl transmuted abruptly into a whine, and the German Shepherd hared off for Winry's workshop with his tail between his legs, clearly knowing when discretion was the better part of valor. "Coward," Ed muttered under his breath.

"Where's my babies?" Izumi yelled as she entered the house, pulling off her overcoat. A chorus of young voices answered her, chanting "Auntie Izumi! Auntie Izumi is here!" Children tumbled out of every corner of the house, abandoning whatever game had been absorbing them in favor of this new, much better distraction. Izumi tossed her coat over her shoulder, and Ed made a dive for it as children swarmed over Izumi, dark and blond heads alike.

"Did you bring me anything? Did you?" Peter cried, clinging to Izumi's leg. "Auntie Izumi, come see what I made!" Terry fussed, tugging at her arm. "Auntie Izumi, Auntie Izumi," Sara chanted, still captivated enough by her _presence_ that she hadn't immediately thought of some new diversion for her.

"You are so spoiling them," Ed accused, taking Sig's coat as he handed it over silently and going in search of a free coathook.

"Somebody has to do it," Izumi said smugly, gathering Peter in her arms and hefting him over her head. He squealed, and laughed as she spun him around, then handed him off to her husband in order to do the same with Sara. "Oh, look at you, you're getting so big!"

"Sensei, what are you doing here?" Al trailed out into the living room, still in an apron and holding a pair of cooking tongs. "I thought you weren't coming until tomorrow."

Sig answered, since Izumi seemed fully absorbed by turning Terry upside down. "We took the red-liner last night instead of staying in a motel," he grunted. "Is it all right if we spend the night here?"

"Of course, we can put you, uh..." Something from the kitchen distracted Al, and he vanished back that way for a minute, reappearing with a fork in place of the tongs. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were going to be here, I'm not sure there'll be enough for everyone."

"I'm sure it will be fine," Izumi answered, unperturbed. "We ate the food they served on the train, even if it was no good. And aside from that, Ed will just have to not eat like a pig for once."

"Hey!" Ed objected sharply.

Scieszka trailed out into the living room then, and deftly deflected Peter from pulling down Izumi and Sig's coats from the hook. "That's rude, Peter," she said. "Wait until Auntie Izumi is ready to give you your present. What are you doing in the area anyway, Mrs. Curtis?"

"I mean, you were just out here two weeks ago," Ed snorted, "and then the week before that. You can't possibly have that many holiday weekends. What's your excuse anyway?"

"Oh," Izumi said vaguely, pulling mysterious parcels out of her pockets and distributing them among the children. "There was this cow."

Ed and Scieszka exchanged a look. "Cow?" Scieszka hazarded.

"Yes, this, uh... needed investigating..." Izumi was clearly not paying attention at all. Sig was deadpan as a brick.

Ed rolled his eyes. Scieszka barely stifled a giggle.

* * *

Since Al cooked, Winry was on the roster to clean up. Scieszka volunteered to help her, and in short order the girls had shooed everyone else out of the house. Whether that was to get them out from underfoot, as Winry claimed, or to make sure there would be no witnesses if they chose to do inappropriate things with soapsuds, as Ed suspected, nobody really complained.

There was still plenty of light, the soft summer afternoon giving way only reluctantly to evening. Al settled on the porch, a book in hand that he didn't seem terribly interested in reading; he was content just to watch the scene and the sunset, and feel the gentle evening breezes against his skin. The children did their best to make their guests feel at home by playing their favorite 'jungle gym' game with Sig, namely the one where he was the gym.

Ed, meanwhile, found himself pacing back and forth, trying to work up the nerve or the stomach to do this. Izumi must have seen his restlessness, because she came over to sit down next to him. Not pressuring, just waiting.

Ed took a deep breath. "I'm glad you came," he said. "I've been wanting to talk to you about something."

Izumi gave him an expectant look. "About the kids?" she asked.

Ed nodded, but didn't continue immediately. Instead, the two of them watched the children playing, climbing up and down and over the very-forbearing Sig.

"They're good kids," Izumi said softly, watching them. "And every inch Elrics."

"I know." Ed put his head in his hands. "That's the trouble."

Izumi turned to regard him, as well. "Does this have anything to do with the little treasure Terry was so proud to show me this afternoon?" she asked him.

Ed sighed. "You saw it," he said, "his array? He was drawing them all over the walls a week ago. We had to give him some chalk and a space on the floor, in the end."

"Ah." Izumi readjusted herself on the porch swing, looking comfortable. "So the little tyke's discovered alchemy. I'm not surprised, considering whose son he is."

"I'm not surprised either," Ed said. "Well. I am a little. He's only... God. He's only five."

"Wasn't that how old Alphonse was, when the two of you started practicing alchemy for the first time?" Izumi asked, spearing him with a sharp glance.

"Yeah." Ed hunched his shoulders. "Yeah, it was."

Izumi waited a beat, but Ed was not forthcoming. "Well, what's the problem?" she said. "From what I've seen, the kid's a bombshell of talent. If you and your brother train him he could be brilliant. Aren't you proud?"

Ed laughed. "Proud? God. Yes, I'm proud. I'm also terrified, Izumi."

"Why?" Izumi tilted her head to the side.

"Why? Why? You even have to ask me that?" Ed's hands clenched in his hair. "Look at what alchemy did to me and my brother. I don't even need to be telling you this. Look at what it did to _you._ I don't want that any child of mine to walk that path."

He stopped, and took a deep breath, before continuing. "Just thinking about it makes it hard to breathe. He's only five and he's already drafting circles and making toys in his room. What'll happen next? I jump a foot in the air every time he claps. I don't want what happened to my brother, to happen to him. Never. Never."

Izumi sat back, silent for a moment. At last she said, "What are you planning to do, then? Forbid him from practicing alchemy? With Alphonse's work, and your own research, that won't be easy. He'll never understand why you won't want him to do what his fathers are doing."

"I know." Ed tugged sharply at his hair. "I don't know what to do. I haven't got any idea. Al doesn't either. We don't know what to do. Alchemy nearly destroyed us, Izumi, but it's a part of us, like our skin, like our own eyes. We couldn't stop doing it any more than we could stop breathing. We can't stop Terry from discovering it either, it's in his blood. If what you say is true, then someday he might be an even greater alchemist than either of us. But what if that means he feels greater pain, too?"

Ed ran down. For a long moment neither of them spoke. On the lawn, Sara shrieked, and Peter tackled Terry to the ground, where the two of them wrestled. Al was watching them too, Ed noticed, and wondered if they both had the same expression on their face.

Izumi said, "There's nothing good or bad about alchemy itself, Edward. You know that perfectly well. It's a tool; in the right hands, it can be a powerful force for good, just like in someone else's hand, it can be a dangerous weapon."

"It can be dangerous even if it's not a weapon," Ed said. "You can make the worst mistake of your life thinking all the while that you're doing a great thing."

"That may be so," Izumi said softly. She sighed. "I don't know why you asked me, Ed. I'm not your parent. I'm not anybody's parent."

"You're the wisest person I know," Ed replied.

"Don't be an idiot," Izumi snorted. "I'm figuring things out stumbling around in the dark, just like the rest of you."

"You've always known what's right and what's wrong, even when we didn't know it ourselves," Ed said. He looked up, and met Izumi's eyes for the first time. "We weren't wrong when we chose you to be our teacher."

Her own eyes were dark, full of old pain. It made Ed wince to see it, but he didn't back down. "I'm not sure of that," she said softly. "The most important thing I had to teach you, I couldn't."

He looked away. "That wasn't your fault," he said. "We made our own decision."

She turned her hand palm upwards, as if letting something fly away. "There's your answer, Edward," she said. "You can't make choices for your children. You can't strangle their mistakes before they happen, without also strangling them. The best you can do is love them, give them all the power you can, and hope that they turn out all right. That's the pain of being a parent."

Ed rested his forehead against his knees. "I don't know anything about being a parent," he moaned. "I just want my children to be happy."

"Hm." Izumi regarded Ed's curled-up form for a minute, and a smile tugged at the side of her mouth. "Edward, what are your memories of alchemy like, from your own childhood?"

"Huh?" He blinked up at her, uncurling slightly. "Oh... I don't know. It was always something we just... did. And then..." He trailed off.

"Before then," she said. "What were your memories of alchemy like, before your mother died?"

"Happy," he answered immediately.

"Well, then." Izumi leaned back, obscurely satisfied. Ed gave her a confused look, so she let the small smile escape her. "Don't die."

"Huh." Ed paused, and thought about that for a minute. "Huh," he snorted. "So that's your advice? 'Don't die'?"

"That's damn good advice," Izumi intoned. "You wanted it, now you've got it. Don't be an ungrateful kid."

"I am not," Ed began, but he never finished. Peter came barreling over to them, Sara hot on his heels, Terry trailing after, yelling something about dessert and marshmellows and could they start a fire to toast them please please please Aunt Izumi? And Izumi laughed, and pulled Sara into her lap as Ed grabbed Peter in mid-fling. "Hey, don't kill Aunt Izumi, you little monsters," Ed yelled. "You want a fire? In the middle of summer? What, are you nuts?"

"It might be nice, brother," Al called from the porch. "But we should wait for Winry and Scieszka."

"Hear that?" Ed told his children. "Go bother your mothers. They know where the marshmallows are, anyway."

Willingly enough, the children pelted off into the house. Al shook his head, laughing, and opened his book at last. Izumi raised an eyebrow at Ed.

"Now, what were you saying?" she said, in a teasing tone. "You aren't what?"

Ed stepped backwards into the yard, arms held out for balance as he turned in a circle on his toes. "Ungrateful," he said. And smiled.

* * *

~to be continued.


	4. 4 Made Whole

**Title**: Made Whole  
**Rating**: PG  
**Warnings**: Unconventional living arrangements, angst, chibi angst**  
**

* * *

The kitchen was a madhouse, but that was to be expected in the Elric household at mealtimes.

It was fortunate that it was a large kitchen, open on one end to the dining room, or else Ed and Scieszka wouldn't be able to maneuver around each other, each working on their own dishes for dinner. Over at the dining table, one-and-a-half-year-old Sara hummed and chattered happily in her high chair, busily engaged in deciding which one of her toys she wanted to throw next. Erwin had himself tucked into the niche by the kitchen door, watching his humans go about their business, tail occasionally thumping on the mat. Edward, typically enough, was getting in the way.

Ed leaned over the stove and sniffed, poking at the cutlets with a long fork. "Are you sure they aren't done yet?" he said somewhat plaintively. "They look cooked to me."

Scieszka huffed at him and pushed her glasses up her nose. "Of course they look done on the outside," she said. "But they're still not cooked on the inside. They've still got ten minutes to go, so let them alone."

"But they smell so good!" Ed said, taking a long sniff. "They'll burn if we leave them too long."

"If you eat improperly cooked meat, you'll get sick!" Scieszka told him, waving her vegetable knife around for emphasis. "And then we'll have to take you all the way to the doctor in town to get you treated for food poisoning. So unless you want that, leave them alone and check on the oil."

Ed gulped, a nervous look crossing his face briefly at the thought of a doctor visit, and he backed hastily away from the stove. Edging around Scieszka, he took the lid off the low, cast-iron saucepan, and eyed the bubbling golden liquid inside. "It looks ready to me," he told her.

"Okay, good." Scieszka beamed, and finished chopping the vegetables with a flourish. She added the last few stalks to the large metal colander and stepped back, hands on her hips "I came up with a batter to put these in, so as soon as they're rinsed we can start frying them."

"You came up with?" Ed sounded doubtful, and Scieszka glared at him.

"What's wrong with that? The last few things I just came up with tasted perfectly good, didn't they? You just don't like to deviate from recipes! You have no imagination!"

Ed shrugged. "In chemistry," he said, "deviating from the process is a good way to get yourself exploded or burned. Cooking is -"

The familiar, friendly argument was interrupted by the ring of the phone, further into the house. "Can someone get that?" Winry yelled from upstairs, accompanied by a loud crashing sound.

"Oh -" Scieszka grabbed a dishrag and wiped her hands, then fumbled with her glasses again. "I'll get it. Ed, will you stay here and wash the vegetables? I shouldn't take long, but if I do, you can just start putting them in the batter, okay?"

She vanished through the doorway, and Ed gave a little growl of frustration. Somehow, despite both girls' enthusiasm for cooking, why did it always end up being him who peeled the potatoes or rinsed the vegetables? He sighed, resigned, as the click of the phone and Scieszka's voice sounded from the other room, and picked up the vegetables to take them over to the sink.

"Okay, disgusting green things, we're having it out," he addressed the pot, as it filled with water. "You'd better taste as good after this as Scieszka says you will, or else there's no way I'm eating you, and I have my doubts about subjecting my kids to you either."

Across the room, Sara giggled in response. She didn't always get what he said, but she was old enough by now to pick up on the fact that when Edward grumbled, nobody else in the house paid him any respect, so she didn't need to either.

He picked up the pot, with a small grunt - both of his arms barely circled around the damn thing, and full of water as it was, it was heavy! - and started to carry it across the kitchen to the counter where the hot oil was waiting.

At that moment, a number of things happened.

First, a young, excited shout sounded from somewhere in the house - Terry, getting caught up in some game, Ed classified it automatically. Second, a small black and white streak of fur dashed into the kitchen, tail bottle-brushed and whiskers stiff, and immediately bolted back out. Erwin startled up, ears pricked, and bounded after the fleeing cat, all good sense lost in the thrill of the chase. He slammed into the back of Ed's leg as he passed, and Ed yelped, stumbling forward. The pot full of vegetables and water sloshed dangerously, and he grabbed for the counter with one hand to steady himself. Holding it at arm's length, he managed to get the pot full of water resting on the edge of the counter, and pushed it upright before it could spill too much.

The vegetables slid along the wet counter, bumped into the iron kettle, and before Ed could straighten himself out he had an entire kettleful of hot oil poured onto his right arm.

He was pretty sure he yelled - not so much because of pain as because of startlement - because Erwin put his tail between his legs and fled from the room like a bat out of hell. Ed barely registered the startled thumps that sounded further into the house, though; he was too busy grabbing at his right shoulder with his left hand and scrabbling for the release catch on his arm.

The heat hadn't quite traveled all the way up his arm yet, but it wouldn't take long; already the temperature in the port was rising uncomfortably fast, and a spike of warning pain shot through his shoulder. His desperate fingers finally found the catch, and with a yank that stung warningly he managed to dislocate the steel brand from his shoulder and let it fall.

For a moment the port kept on heating, sending a burning pain through his shoulder as the energy bled off; without the heat source to feed it, though, it quickly peaked and died away. Edward's breath hissed out between his teeth, and he suddenly became conscious of the burning-hot oil soaking his shirt and seeping through to his skin. With a muttered curse he grabbed the hem with his remaining hand and started struggling to pull it over his head.

"Brother!" A pair of much defter hands helped him pull off the shirt and toss it aside. Al was beside him, expression knotted with worry. "What happened? Are you okay?"

"Spilled the oil," he gritted out, pressing his hand against the automail port to try and dispel the lingering heat, and he looked down at the automail lying in a puddle of hot oil. Spots all over his chest and stomach were beginning to hurt, with the stinging ache that oil burns always brought, and his shoulder throbbed uncomfortably, but nothing seemed to be too damaged. "Managed to get it off before it could burn me, but -"

A sudden sound alerted him, from the far end of the kitchen, and Ed broke off to look over to the dining room. Sara sat frozen in her highchair, eyes huge, small hands clenched around the edge of the tray. Her chin wobbled, mouth opening and closing, as she stared at the now gaping-empty port on Ed's shoulder.

"S-sara?" Ed said hesitantly, forgetting the minor pain of the burns. He made a hesitant motion towards her, stepping gingerly in the still-spreading mess.

The little girl took a huge breath, and started screaming.

* * *

Footsteps on the stairs warned him that someone was coming, but he didn't look up until Winry entered the bedroom, closing the door softly behind her. "Hey there," she said softly, a little uncertain.

Ed looked down again, at the hand in his lap. Just one. "How's Sara?" he asked.

"She's fine," Winry said brusquely. "Shez managed to get her calmed down, and put her to bed. Al said he'd stay up to watch her, just in case."

"Oh." Ed shrugged his shoulders, then winced.

Winry caught the wince, of course, and the next moment she sat beside him on the bed, putting one hand on his shoulder. "I took a look at your arm," she said. "It doesn't look damaged, although I'll want to make sure the connections are clear before we reattach it. It just needs a good cleaning, and it'll be good as..."

She trailed off. Ed wasn't looking at her. "You don't need to feel bad, Ed," she said anxiously. "Sara's young. She doesn't really understand what she saw, that's all. Probably by morning she'll have forgotten all about it."

"I don't see how she can forget about it." Ed hunched over slightly. "It's not something that's going to go away, after all. She's gonna see it again every time she looks at me. If it's horrible enough that it made her start screaming this time, why shouldn't it do that again?"

"It's not horrible," Winry said vehemently. "It's just automail. There's nothing strange about it and Sara shouldn't get so upset about it. After all, I run an entire business of automail replacement! She's just going to have to get used to it, that's all there is to it!"

"Huh." Ed looked down at the floor, frowning deeply. Then he glanced back up at her, lips twitching with sardonic humor. "Well, at least this will be useful in the future," he said mockingly. "If she's ever bad, all we have to say is 'Sara, do as you're told, or else Daddy will take off his shirt again.' It'll be -"

"Stop that!" Winry's voice rose sharply, and Ed blinked at her, cut off. She grabbed his other shoulder, and pulled him around until he was sitting on the bed facing her. "Ed, you have nothing to be ashamed of. It's just a part of who you are. Sara will learn to accept that, because you're her father, and we're a family. We love all of you, Ed - not just the ordinary parts!"

He didn't answer her, at least not in words, and Winry sighed in frustration and reached up to tug on a lock of her hair. She was surprised when Ed suddenly reached out and put his hand on her shoulder, drawing her in close, and rested his head against her collarbone.

She blinked down at him, startled, and hesitantly circled his back with her arm. While Ed was no stranger to cuddling, this kind of action was new for him.

"Winry, what would I have ever done without you?" he said faintly. "I swear to god I wouldn't have made it if not for you. I always knew... in my head, at least... that losing my arm and my leg was p - was the price I paid for making that mistake. I knew - I _knew_that, the automail was the stigma I had to carry, so that I could never forget what I'd done. I never forgot that it was - all my fault."

She couldn't find anything to say. He lifted his head, and he looked terribly young, for a moment, eyes sad and lost. "But it was never like that to you," he said softly. "You and auntie both, but especially you... it was never anything shameful, anything bad to you. Missing limbs is - was normal. Automail to you was never anything worse than functional, sometimes beautiful."

"Ed -" Winry started, but Ed put a finger to his lips, shushing her.

"I just wanted to say... thank you, I guess," he said, and now he was starting to look embarrassed. "Al and I were able to move forward, because you treated us just the same afterwards. If not for you I - I don't know what we would have done."

"That's not quite true," Winry admitted, hesitant and a little shamefaced. "There was a difference. You weren't just another patient to us, you know. You were - still are - very important to us. I was - I was proud that you let me work on your arm and leg for me. I felt like it brought me closer to you. And then I felt bad, for feeling good about that."

Ed shook his head, loose strands of hair flying about his face. Winry reached up to smooth them back, and kept on petting her fingers through his hair, even afterwards. "You don't need to feel bad," he said. "None of it was your fault. You made me feel like - even with the automail - I was still a whole person."

He leaned forward, and Winry shifted, scooting back on the edge of the mattress, guiding his head gently down. He curled up on his side, pillowing his head on her lap, and sighed. His hand came to grip her knee, and something about the tension in his muscles told Winry that no matter what reassuring words she said, she couldn't make all this magically go away for him.

Some things were said even better without words. She just held him.

* * *

"Hey," Al said, quietly, from the door. "The boys were hungry, so Scieszka and I put together some breakfast. Nothing fancy, but there's still some left if you want some..."

"Not hungry," Ed said, but sighed. "Breakfast. Geez. I completely forgot. Al, how did you get to be so responsible? It's obviously not the genes." He brooded for a bit, before adding on, "I don't know what the hell I'm doing. I'm a terrible parent."

"What you're terrible about," Al said, shutting the door and coming over to stand in front of Ed, "is insisting that everything is your fault, even when it's not. You'll notice that Winry didn't think of dinner either, but you don't call her a bad parent."

"I guess so." He pushed himself up, blowing his hair out of his face, and tried on a smile for Al. "How is Sara feeling?" he asked, managing to keep his voice steady.

Alphonse hesitated, then sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed beside his brother. "Still upset," he admitted. "Scieszka got her to sleep, but she keeps waking up crying. She says she has nightmares about - her Papa falling into pieces."

"Oh, God," Edward groaned, and buried his face in his hand, fisting his fingers in his hair. "I don't know what to say to her," he said quietly.

"Neither do I." Al put an arm over his brother's shoulder, and hugged him lightly. For a moment he paused, chewing on his lower lip and looking away, before he finally said quietly, "Especially because I have those same dreams sometimes myself, Brother."

Ed jerked his head up, startled, and blinked over at Al. For a moment, he didn't seem to quite know what to say, before he looked down again. "Funny," he said, with a little catch in his voice. "I'd think that of all the things to dream about - that night, that other things would bother you more."

"I have more than one bad dream about that night," Alphonse admitted quietly. "It was the worst night of my life. I thought you were going to die, Brother. I thought you were going to be torn apart and bleed to death in front of my eyes. That's not something I'll forget easily."

"Your priorities are screwed up, Al," Ed observed. He pushed himself up, and sighed. Al waited patiently for him to say whatever was on his mind.

"Someday, Al," Ed said at last, "we're gonna have to tell them everything. We'll have to tell them about that night, about what we did, and what happened. We'll have to tell them about the armor, and the Alchemist test, and the Philosopher's Stone. We'll have to tell them why you and I are... like we are, and why you're normal now and I'm not ever going to be. We're going to tell them who we are, and what we did, because we're not going to be able to hide it from them forever."

"That day is a long way off, Brother," Al reminded him. "They're still too young to understand, even if we told them."

"We have to tell them something." Ed scowled at the floor. "It's no good hoping that they just won't notice, or won't wonder, or won't ask about anything for the next twelve years. Until they're old enough to hear everything."

"We don't have to tell them everything," Al whispered, and Ed looked up to meet his eyes. He wondered if his own were as haunted, and suspected that they were. "There are some things they don't need to know, Brother. Some things I don't want them to ever know."

"Then we'll have to tell them why we couldn't tell them," Ed said, and his hand closed into a fist. "Especially Terry. He's too damn clever for his age, if you ask me. If he ever starts studying alchemy he'll know exactly how much we're holding back."

Al sighed. "We don't have to decide this yet, Brother," he said, in a slightly pleading tone. "They're still so young. Terry's not even five yet. For now the best we can do is try to bring them up as best we can."

"Huh." Ed flopped back onto the bed, and Al couldn't help but smile that he'd relaxed just enough to do that. "I think they understand more than you think, Al."

"I hope not," Al replied.

* * *

Papa Al had left, and Sara was just as glad to be alone; she clung to Mr. Bird and sniffled softly, keeping two fingers in her mouth to suck on. Mama Winry said that she was getting to old to suck on her thumb, so she thought this was the next best thing.

This morning Mama Winry had gotten her out of bed and taken her into the big room behind the house that she wasn't usually allowed to go into; Mama's workshop. She told Sara that this was where she did her work, meeting with people to talk about giving them automail.

She'd said a lot more stuff about automail, and tried to convince Sara that it was a good thing and that she didn't need to be afraid of it, but Sara didn't see what was so good about it at all. The big room had been full of arms and legs and it was scary, almost as much as watching Daddy fall apart in the kitchen had been. She didn't even want to think about how many people must have fallen apart to fill up that room, and instead of listening to Mama, she'd hidden her face in Mr. Bird and refused to look until Mama carried her out again.

Someone came into her room, and she held onto Mr. Bird a little tighter, but it wasn't Daddy or even Mama; it was Terry, and Peter dragging behind him. She sat up a little, and sniffed again, and rubbed her eyes.

"What are you crying about?" Terry asked curiously, coming to stand by her bed.

Sara took a breath and leaned forward a bit, in the secret-telling pose. "Daddy's arm isn't real," she whispered. "It falls off."

"Oh, that?" Terry shrugged, and sat down on the edge of the bed. "I already _knew_that. Why are you crying over it?"

Of course he knew. Terry knew _everything._So why didn't he understand why she was crying? She glared at him, lip quivering, trying not to cry again.

"Daddy's real," Peter spoke up, sitting on the other side. "It's just that his arm is special. It's metal, like machines."

Sara shook her head. She didn't know how to explain just what was so upsetting to her; why she felt so certain that any time Daddy could come apart into pieces and Mama could put them up with the others on the wall; why she was afraid that Daddy would disappear and there would be only fake pieces left.

"It's called automail," Terry explained. "Mama Winry makes it. She makes Daddy's arm, too. That's why it's the best."

"But it's not real!" Sara said, and in a burst of temper, threw Mr. Bird away from her. "I don't want Daddy not to be real!"

Peter got off the bed, and picked him up, frowning unhappily. Terry looked thoughtful. "People don't just turn into automail for no reason," he said. "Sometimes people get hurt, hurt so bad that they can't use their normal arm or leg any more. Daddy got hurt like that, once, and that's why his arm is special. But he's not hurt now."

Sara frowned, processing that. Peter offered Mr. Bird back to her, and she took him and hugged him, sorry that she had made him sad. "Daddy got hurt?" she asked.

Terry nodded seriously. "And Mama Winry made the arm for him," he said. "She said it's the best she ever made. For other people she can make all kinds of arms and legs, but Daddy's is special. Nobody else's is the same."

"So you shouldn't cry," Peter said softly. "Because of Mama Winry, Daddy got better. He's not hurt any more."

"But it came off," Sara protested; although for some reason, the idea wasn't as scary as it had been before.

"Mama Winry can put it back on," Terry said confidently. "That's what's special about automail, you can take it off and put it back on again and it's just the same as it was before. So don't cry, okay? You're making Mama and Daddy upset."

Sara sniffled again, and rubbed her nose; then she nodded. Terry knew _everything._

* * *

Winry managed to more-or-less blackmail Ed into coming out of his room, telling him in no uncertain terms that she wasn't going to let him sulk all day. He protested he wasn't sulking, but proving it required him to actually show some interest in doing something other than sitting and thinking in his room. So he'd moved to the den downstairs, and occupied himself with a book while Winry finished cleaning out his arm.

When Sara came in, flanked by Terry and Peter, it took him completely by surprise. He nearly dropped the book, and then couldn't decide whether he should get up and leave the room, or if he should talk to Sara, of if he _shouldn't _talk to her for fear of making her cry again.

She took the decision out of his hands, though, when she marched right up to his chair and held out her hands to be picked up. "Daddy," she said.

Ed blinked, but automatically reached down and scooped her up with his good arm. "Hey, Sara," he said gently. "Feeling better?"

Sara sucked on her forefinger, a frown covering her small face as she looked up at him, then over at his shoulder. Ed winced, wishing he'd put on a sleeved shirt to cover over the port, but he'd been anticipating putting the arm back in and the sleeve would have been in the way.

Sara crawled over his lap, and reached up to put her hand on the edge of the port. "Daddy," she said seriously. "You got hurt?"

Startled, Ed looked up, and found both of his sons watching them. He swallowed, and looked down at Sara. "Yeah," he said. "It was a long, long time ago, though. I was still a little kid then. Someday..." His voice wavered, and he cleared his throat. "Someday when you're bigger I'll tell you about it."

Sara didn't really pay attention to that part of his speech; the idea of a Daddy who was anything other than the grownup he was now wasn't really in her comprehension. The important thing was that Daddy had been hurt and this special metal part was supposed to make him better. "Does it still hurt?" she wanted to know.

Ed winced; he wasn't really sure what to tell her. But he took a deep breath, and went for honesty. "Sometimes," he said. "It gets achy if it rains or is cold. And, uh, if it comes off like now, it hurts, a little."

Okay, not entirely honest. But there was no way he intended to let Sara - let any of his kids - see that part of the process. He would remove himself - or them - from the house first, far enough that there would be nothing for them to hear. The last thing they needed as an example was their Daddy acting like a baby.

He'd let himself be distracted, and barely noticed Sara looking back at Terry for instruction, and Terry giving her a nudge. And so it came as a surprise when Sara leaned against his chest and placed a very wet kiss at the edge of the automail port. She looked up to meet his dumbfounded gaze.

"That's what Mama Scieszka does," she said, "to make hurts better."

"Oh," Ed said, a little stunned. "Thank - Thank you, Sara." He smiled. "Huh, it feels better already!"

She smiled back, and even managed to giggle a little, although when she did there was still a little bit of teariness in it. She leaned against his chest, and sighed, and closed her eyes; without even thinking about it, Ed put his good arm around her and hugged her close.

He felt - a lot of things, all of them good, but the only one he managed to decipher out of the dizzy tangle was _relief. _Maybe he didn't know what he was doing as a parent, after all. But just now, he sure as hell felt like he was whole.

* * *

**Author's Notes**: All of the children in the Elric/Rockbell household are raised communally, without regard to who their biological parents are, and all of the children refer to both their mothers as "Mama" and both their fathers as "Papa." But just in case any readers are curious: Terry is Ed and Scieszka's son (he was conceived before they married) and Sara is Winry and Ed's daughter. Peter is Winry's son and they aren't sure who his father is, although Ed secretly thinks of him as Al's son and dotes on him accordingly. Scieszka and Al are close friends, but do not sleep together, so they do not have any shared children.

~to be continued.


	5. 5 One Road Home

**Title**: One Road Home  
**Rating**: PG-13  
**Warnings**: Angst, fluff, sap.  
**Author's Notes**: No commentary is made on their unusual living arrangements here, largely because Roy doesn't pick up on them. As far as he knows, Scieszka and Ed are married and Winry and Al are married and that's all there is to it; they just happen to share a house.

* * *

Roy had been to Risembourg only once before, on a night he was never likely to forget. It looked very different now, in the sunlight under a clear sky; what looked in the dark like a dreary and desolate landscape devoid of lights was instead a wide, peaceful sanctuary. It was entirely alien to him. That was why he'd chosen to bring Lieutenant Colonel Armstrong along; the man had seen this little village in better times, more recently, and was more familiar with the layout than Roy.

Not that it was easy to get lost in Risembourg. It was little more than a farming village in the middle of nowhere, and only one country lane led off in the direction of the new Elric residence.

Roy appraised it as they neared, trying to get a feel for the people who lived there. It was a relatively new house, and Roy suspected Fullmetal had a hand in its construction, given some of the elaborate stonework and woodwork around the corners. It was a large house, larger than the one that Edward had grown up in, with a second, smaller building attached along the back; the path split off and led around that way, with a sign for "Automail Repair" proclaiming it as a workshop. Edward lived here, the file stated, with his brother and the Rockbell girl. And his wife.

With Armstrong a solid, imposing presence at his back, Roy knocked on the front door. He put his gloved hands into his pockets as he waited; he had no idea what kind of reception he would receive, but it was better to be prepared for anything.

The door opened, and Roy had to blink a few times before he was able to make the connection between the young man standing before him and the huge set of armor that Roy's memories always identified as 'Fullmetal's brother.' "Alphonse Elric," he greeted the young man. "Good afternoon."

Al didn't look at all surprised to see him, nodding in greeting as his gray-green eyes moved from Roy to Armstrong behind him. "Good afternoon, General," he answered. "Lieutenant Colonel. Why don't you come inside?"

They stepped inside, Roy feeling rather awkward. He glanced around the inside of the warmly-lit, cozy home; no Edward in sight. Al vanished through a doorway that Roy suspected led to a kitchen, and Roy took the time to pull off his gloves and return them to his pockets before Alphonse returned.

Roy cleared his throat. "I, ah, I'm sorry to drop in on you so suddenly."

"I knew you were coming." Al, ever the polite host, set out a tray of tea and cookies on the coffee table. "I read the letters you send."

One of Roy's eyebrows lifted. "Really?" That thought encouraged him, and he smiled. Maybe his case wasn't so hopeless after all. "Knowing your brother, I would have half expected him to burn them as soon as he gets them."

"He does burn them." Al shrugged. "But I read them first. Please, have a seat."

Awkwardly, Roy did. Armstrong sat on the couch opposite, quiet, his usual exuberant manner subdued. He tended to get this way, Roy thought, when carrying out orders he found distressing or distasteful, and wondered which this was.

Alphonse poured tea for both of them. Roy cleared his throat again. "So, Alphonse. You seem to be in good health; your appearance has improved since when last I saw you."

"Yes, well, it's been a while." Al smiled, but his eyes were serious. He also sat himself down, but then leaned forward in his chair and planted his hands on the table. "General, it's not like you to dance around a subject with pleasantries. Please get to the point of your visit."

"Very well." Roy sat up straight, and felt his face closing off. "To put it simply, Alphonse, I am here in an effort to get your brother to take back his place in the military."

Alphonse was shaking his head even before Roy finished his sentence. "I thought as much," he said. "The answer is no, General. Brother's place is here."

Although he was expecting something like this, Roy couldn't help but be a little irritated. He reached for a cookie, just to have something to do with his hands and eyes while he talked. "It's Edward's decision to make, Alphonse, not yours. After all, it's not like he's doing any other work, at the moment. Perhaps he would be happy to return to the military, now that he's had a chance to rest for a time."

"Brother's answer will be the same. Except he won't be nearly so polite about it," Al warned him.

"I believe that I can convince him to change his mind," Roy murmured.

Al frowned at him, hands tightening on his knees. "I wouldn't be certain of that, General."

Roy shrugged, smiling slightly, but Al wasn't finished. "But you can be certain of this; you won't bribe, threaten, intimidate, blackmail, or manipulate my brother into going back and doing your dirty work for you. I would consider any attempt to do so an attack, and react accordingly."

"Was that a threat, Alphonse?" Roy said mildly. Behind Alphonse, Armstrong shifted unhappily, tensing for a confrontation.

"No. Just a statement of fact." Al ignored Armstrong entirely; he just picked up a cookie of his own and bit down on it.

Roy sighed. It looked like one way or another, he was going to have to deal with Alphonse before Edward. "It's not that I don't understand your feelings," he said, letting his officer-voice slip for a moment, speaking more informally.

"Contrary to what you seem to think, I'm not searching for ways to make your lives difficult. But we need him, Alphonse. The fighting on the Northern border is growing more intense, and the casualties... are becoming... unacceptable. You and your brother," and Roy had to stop and take a breath, control himself, "are irreplaceable resources to the military - not just as weapons, but also as -"

Al was shaking his head again, looking more and more upset, and he interrupted. "General, that argument isn't going to work," he said. "If Brother had never sat for the State Alchemist exam, then you would have found some way to get along without him. No one person is irreplaceable, not even him."

Roy regarded Al levelly, keeping his expression as calm as he could. "My men are dying, Alphonse."

"That's not our fault!" Al stood up quickly, hands tightened to fists at his sides. "Don't try to manipulate us through guilt. People will die no matter what we do, or don't do, and their deaths are the responsibility of the military, not on us. I'm only responsible for my family."

Roy decided to change tactics. "This isn't merely my fancy, Alphonse," he pointed out. "I would be happy to leave you and your brother in peace, but the senior brass has expressed a very clear interest in returning the Fullmetal Alchemist to his duties. I am under orders to see that that happens."

Al tilted his head to the side, looking politely disbelieving. "General, I know you, and frankly I find it hard to believe that you couldn't find some way around that if you wanted to."

"If I wanted to," Roy agreed.

Al didn't answer that immediately, and Roy readied himself to take the offensive again. Before he could, however, Al turned and strode to a doorway that led farther into the house. "Scieszka?" he called through it. "We have guests."

"They're here?" floated back a familiar voice; a moment later a young woman, with dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, stepped through the door. In her arms was a tiny, bright-eyed blond girl.

Roy found himself frozen in his seat, as though he'd been nailed there. This was - Oh. Al had absolutely _no_ right to reprimand him for attempting to manipulate people through guilt. This was just - Clearly, he had underestimated Al's capacity for sneakiness.

Scieszka hitched up the child against her shoulder, and used her free hand to push her glasses up her nose as she blinked at them. "Oh, Major Armstrong, it's you," she exclaimed, sounding pleased. "How are you - it's been so long since we've talked!"

Armstrong brightened up at her presence, breaking his nervous silence for the first time. "Ah, Scieszka," he rumbled, standing hastily from the couch. "Indeed, it has been too long! I have seen met you since the day of your wedding, I believe..."

"Oh, yes!" Scieszka pinked prettily as she smiled. "It was so good of you to come, Major. I know Edward appreciated it, too."

"It's Lieutenant Colonel now," Armstrong added. "And who is this lovely young girl, hmmm? Your daughter?" He bent in close, sparkles appearing over his head. The little girl stared at him, openmouthed.

Scieszka laughed, and lifted the child up a little more. "Yes, this is my daughter, Sara," she said. "Sara, say hello!"

Over Scieszka's shoulder, Al was watching him, his eyes calculating. Roy made an effort to unclench his teeth, and glare back. Al's strategy was entirely transparent, and he oughtn't have been taken by surprise by it.

But nothing in Edward's admittedly out of date file had said anything about _children,_ damn it.

"It's definitely a pleasure to see you again, Mrs. Elric," Roy announced, forcing himself out of his seat. Scieszka blinked at him, her smile fading somewhat, and Roy felt unreasonably annoyed. He wasn't used to pretty girls failing to be charmed by him, but then, Scieszka was a far cry from the girls he usually tried to charm. "But we really came to see your husband. Is he in?"

"Oh - Ed is -" Scieszka bit her lip, and looked over at Al. They shared a positively conspiratorial look, and Al nodded. "He's out at the market today, with Peter," she said.

Roy frowned. It wasn't in Edward's nature to avoid confrontation. Al added, "I sent him on an errand."

That explained it. "Well, we'll wait for him," he said smoothly. "In the meantime, won't you join us, Mrs. Elric? We were just having a lovely snack."

"Ed might be a while," Scieszka cautioned, even as she was bouncing Sara in her arms to get a giggle for Armstrong. "We wouldn't want to keep you."

"That's quite all right. I don't mind the company, and the issue I have to discuss with Edward is quite important." He shot a deliberately challenging look at Al. "In fact, you could say I'd be willing to wait here as long as it takes."

Al glared. Even Scieszka frowned, and looked away. Armstrong looked uncomfortable, then tried to cover up the moment with more sparkles.

Tea and cookies resumed; the presence of Scieszka and Sara lightened the atmosphere somewhat, but there was still a decided air of tension. Roy sat stubbornly on the couch, and smiled through all of Al's dark looks; there was no way they were going to shift him from this spot until Ed returned.

"Hey, what's all the noise in here?" came a new voice, and a blond head poked around the doorway. "Al, you didn't say we were going to have a party!"

"Winry!" Scieszka chirped, brightening visibly as the other girl entered. "Lieutenant Colonel Armstrong and General Mustang have come to visit us."

The tall blond girl swung around to look at Roy. Roy looked back, for all of five seconds.

"-On second thought," he said, rising hastily, "I think I'll go meet Edward on the road."

The Rockbell girl had another child attached to her hip - a little boy this time, and Roy gritted his teeth as he brushed past them, feeling the child's eyes following him. The boy's hair was dark, unlike the little girl's bright blond, but there could be no mistaking his parentage, not with those golden eyes.

Nobody had told him about the _children._

* * *

He'd only been in Risembourg once before, but he wasn't likely to get lost. There was only one road that led away from the Elric residence, after all, and he walked slowly along it, not in any hurry; he'd just have to cover the same distance back. It wasn't long, anyway, before he caught sight of a small figure in red coming slowly along the road towards him.

Roy stopped and waited; the other person was hindered by carrying a bag and also, Roy saw as the distance closed, an even smaller person walking along beside him. _Another_ one? Fullmetal had been busy, there could be no question.

He watched them for a while, Edward holding his son's hand, the two of them talking about something and laughing; then he steeled his nerve, and stepped forward to meet them.

Ed looked up, and his gold eyes widened to see Roy there, then narrowed in anger. "Colonel," he said, stopping a few paces away. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to speak with you, Fullmetal," Roy answered.

Ed frowned, gripping his son's hand hard. "You shouldn't call me that any more," he warned. "I turned in my watch. I'm not a State Alchemist any more."

"So you did," Roy said agreeably, tipping his head to one side. "But I think you'll find, Fullmetal, that some things can't be left behind simply by childishly running away from them."

"Why, you -" Ed growled, then cut himself off. As Roy watched, Ed turned, and crouched down until he was face-level with his small son. "Peter, pay attention," he said seriously. "This is going to be one of those things that Daddy does that you are never, ever to do, do you understand?"

Peter nodded, eyes wide. Ed smiled, and patted him on the shoulder. "That's a good boy," he said, and stood up again.

The next thing Roy knew, he was waking up flat on his back on the road with a ringing head and an aching jaw that felt, somehow, as though it had just collided with twenty pounds of angry steel.

He sat up, and gingerly felt at his jaw. Not broken, but he suspected it would need some ice, or he would be unable to talk before long. With a very undignified groan, he pushed himself up, and looked around; Edward and his son were nowhere in sight, and by the arc of the sun, he had been out for more than a few minutes. He got himself levered to his feet, shook his head to dispel the dizziness, and started slowly back towards the Elric household.

It didn't look like Edward was particularly interested in talking.

By the time Roy returned to the house, it seemed that something of a small party was going on. Ed's groceries had apparently been for some special dinner that night; Winry and Alphonse were taking turns in the kitchen, while Scieszka played with Terry and chatted with Armstrong. Edward was nowhere to be seen.

Both Sara and Peter seemed delighted by Armstrong, and much to Roy's disbelief and amusement, were actually climbing up and down the large man like a tree. Armstrong was doing his part by striking and holding various impressive poses, providing a never-ending source of amusement to the children. Roy just wondered with morbid fascination how long Armstrong's shirt was going to remain on, at this rate.

On Roy's entrance, Al gave him a long "I told you so" look, and vanished into the kitchen. He reappeared with a towel full of ice a moment later, which Roy accepted with dignified thanks. Winry appeared in the room a moment later, carrying a large metal spoon, and frowned at him.

"Well, General," she said. "Now that you've said what you came to say, I guess you'll be going."

It was quite clearly a dismissal, but Roy smiled at her around the towel. He would not be dissuaded. "I'm afraid we can't be leaving just yet," he said. Winry scowled, hefting her spoon slightly, and opened her mouth to answer, when Al stepped in unexpectedly.

"No, let him stay," he said, and the look he gave Roy was... strange. Almost challenging. "I'm sure we can put Roy and the Lieutenant Colonel up for the night, after all."

Armstrong hastily came to attention, nearly dropping Terry as he did so. "We would not wish to impose," he rumbled, but Al waved the objection away.

"It would be no trouble," he said, smiling slightly. "In fact, it might even prove... educational."

Roy hmph'ed, disguising it behind the towel. So that was the game Alphonse wanted to play, was it? Well, Roy was more than willing; ice or no ice, a little thing like a punch to the jaw was not going to affect his determination.

If Al threw him out, then Roy would simply come back again, and again - however many times it took. Sooner or later, he would get what he came for. It didn't matter if Edward had a wife, a house, a son, or a dozen children. He could throw a punch, or a tantrum, or a chair, and it wouldn't make a bit of difference. The military still needed - _Roy_ still needed - his invaluable skills and abilities, and Roy was not going to back down while there were lives on the line.

He was just settling in to brood on the matter - _brood,_ not _sulk,_ because sulking was what tactless young men like Edward did, not older men in dignified positions of authority - when he was distracted by a tug on his coat. He blinked, and looked down, into a pair of wide, curious, green eyes.

"Can you do sparkles?" the little girl asked brightly, hand still tangled in the edge of his coat. "Uncle Armstrong can do sparkles."

Roy shot a dark look over at this evidence of blatant desertion on the part of his subordinate. _Uncle_ Armstrong, was it? Armstrong studiously made himself very busy drawing sketches for the boys. Another yank on his coat, and he looked down to see the little girl practically climbing into his lap to get his attention. "I want sparkles," she demanded.

This little girl reminded him a bit of Alicia - when she had been this age, and Roy felt himself softening despite himself. "Well," he said, and cleared his throat. "I can't do sparkles like the Lieutenant Colonel, no. But," he added, as a disappointed pout started to cloud her face, "I can do something like them."

"Really?" Her face dissolved into smiles. "Show me, show me!" she crowed, and Roy had to fight back a smile. He reached into his pocket with deliberate slowness, and her eyes followed his hand intently as he brought out the white gloves and pulled them on. He turned his hand over, showing her the design on the back for a minute, and then - deliberately not using his power at all - snapped.

Bright yellow sparks jumped up from his fingertips, then quickly died. Sara squealed with delight, and that was enough to attract the attention of her brothers. Before Roy quite knew what was happening he was surrounded by all three of the kids, wanting to know what he had done and how he'd done it. He was obliged to repeat the performance, and then again a little higher, so Peter could see.

As he lifted his hand, the eldest boy - the one with Fullmetal's eyes - suddenly reached out and grabbed his wrist, tugging it closer. "That's an array," he said, lifting his eyes to meet Roy's. "An alchemy array, like the ones Papa uses."

Roy felt a slight chill go through him, meeting those eyes, and he nodded. "Yes, it is," he said. "Have you seen your father work with alchemy often?"

"Papa does," Terry corrected him. Before Roy could quite work this out, Peter interrupted, "Where do you know Daddy from before, Uncle Roy?"

Uncle Roy? He boggled at the child for a moment, distracted from the question. Apparently, any adult male who entered the household was 'Uncle' to them. "Well," he said finally, answering Peter's question, "I knew your father for a long time a few years ago. I was his CO, when he was in the mili -"

He nearly bit his tongue when something struck him in the head from the side, vision going silly for a moment. He blinked back into focus to see Al standing next to him, his elbow still held stiffly out. He was carrying a large covered dish. "I'm sorry about that, General," he said with an apologetic smile. "I didn't realize you were there."

Roy glared balefully at him, rubbing the side of his head with a wince. Apparently some topics were off-limits when talking to the children.

"Anyway, it's time for dinner," Al said, directing his comments more to the kids. "Come and get your cups, the table's set."

The kids cheered, and nearly tripped over Roy's feet getting themselves into the dining room, leaving Al and Roy together.

"You could have just said something," Roy said. Al smiled again, but his eyes were hard.

"We don't talk about that," he said. "Not to the kids."

"Why not?" Roy stood, and straightened his coat from where the small pulling hands had crumpled it. "It's nothing to be ashamed of."

Al didn't answer, just turned and went into the dining room. Controlling the impulse to scowl at his back, Roy followed.

Dinner was noisy, crowded - as could be expected, with Armstrong looming over the table - and surprisingly tasty. A far cry from military dormitory food, Roy noted, and even better than the food served at many of Central's restaurants. Or maybe it was just the atmosphere that made the difference, tense as it was.

Ed had reappeared for the meal, although he sat at the opposite end of the table from Roy and ignored him during the course of the meal. Roy found himself seated between Scieszka and her daughter, and managed to make polite conversation with the one and answer a never-ending stream of questions from the other, about his coat and his buttons and the ribbons on his chest and why were his eyes black like Auntie's and why could he make sparkles with his gloves.

As they ate, Roy felt an unfamiliar melancholy settling over him. This, for all his rank and status, was something that he did not have. Oh, he could get a girl any day of the week he wanted one, and have a good time with any number of Central's finest ladies - but this feeling, this atmosphere of home, was one he had not experienced for a long, long time. He had very little contact with his family any more; his parents had grown reclusive in their age, and he'd been estranged from his only sister for many years.

It was the path he had chosen when he enlisted in the military, chosen to make that his life and his career and his family, and he'd never really learned to miss what he'd never had. The closest he had come to this feeling of homeliness was probably on those rare occasions where he hadn't been able to avoid Hughes dragging him back for a family dinner, and those occasions had ceased long ago.

He felt a sudden fierce ache of jealousy for Fullmetal; the boy didn't even know how good he had it. Here he was, a decade and a half younger than Roy, and he'd already gotten a head start on any fool's dream of a perfect little country of his own.

None of this changed his decision at all, of course. Not one bit. It only made his determination to do what he had to do more painful.

Dinner was over before he had quite gotten his bearings, and then Winry was herding the children off while Scieszka started to collect the dishes. Remembering his manners, Roy stood and offered to help. Armstrong, too, made an offer of his Artistic Family Method for Cleaning Dishes, but Scieszka - wisely, Roy thought - turned him down. Al managed to distract the Lieutenant Colonel with an offer to catch up on old times, and before long Roy found himself alone in the kitchen with Fullmetal's wife.

For a few minutes she didn't say anything, collecting the dishes and filling the sink with water. Once she'd gotten started, up to her wrists in suds while Roy carefully rinsed them, did she finally say what was on her mind.

"I know why you're here," she said quietly. "You want him to re-enlist in the military, don't you?"

Roy leaned thoughtfully against the countertop, holding a plate. "Technically, he was never discharged," he told her. "The military never discharges useful men if they can help it, merely holds them on inactive status. With the new threat growing in Drachma, he is being asked to return to active."

Scieszka blinked hard, eyes unusually hard behind her glasses. "I worked in the military records long enough to know what's a bureaucratic fiction," she told him, hands wringing the dishrag hard. "I helped file Ed's discharge papers after our wedding. Anything that's been entered into the archives since then is a lie."

Somewhere further into the house, there came a shriek of childish laughter; apparently, Armstrong was demonstrating his Family Child-Tossing Technique that had been passed down for many generations.

"My dear, surely you worked there long enough to realize that the truth in military records is whatever is convenient to the military," Roy told her, and watched her shoulders stiffen. He sighed, and backed off a little, setting the plate in his hands in the dishrack. "We wouldn't be doing this if there wasn't an urgent need..."

"Urgent for whom?" Scieszka asked tartly, and spared a hand to push her slipping glasses back up her face. It left a trace of soapsuds on her nose, but somehow that didn't make her look any less fierce. "It would have to be extremely urgent to take him away from his home and his family."

"I don't see why you're making such a big deal over this," Roy said, keeping his eyes on the glasses he was wiping. "It's not as though active service is the end of the world, you know. There are plenty of men in the service with wives and families. Edward would be in perfectly good company."

"I see," Scieszka said, and her voice was unfathomable. "Married men with families, just like Brigadier General Hughes, am I right?"

He couldn't stop himself; his head jerked up to look at her sharply. He was just in time to receive the solid slap across his face.

Soapsuds spattered and dripped down the side of his reddening cheek, but he just stared at her, hardly able to credit what had just happened. Her green eyes were brimming with angry tears, and she held her hand like she was ready to bring it back the other way. In the end, though, she just shook her head and lowered her hand, clenching it into a fist. "I just hope," she said, voice thick and catching, "that you pay better respects to Edward's family than you did to Mrs. Hughes and Alicia."

She whirled and stalked out of the room, still wearing the apron and dripping soapsuds, leaving Roy alone with the dishes in the empty kitchen.

After a while, he went to find the towel full of ice that Al had dug up for him earlier. It was all melted by now, of course, but the towel was still cold and wet, and he pressed it against his aching face, willing it to stop the burning in his eyes.

"Got a mean right hook, doesn't she?" came a voice from behind him, and Roy jumped and whirled around, fingers twitching as if to snap. Not that it would have mattered, since he didn't have his gloves on, but the figure leaning against the shadowed doorway just snorted and unfolded itself to come into the room beside him.

"Fullmetal," he greeted the young man, and got the expected angry frown.

"I told you not to call me that," Edward said, shrugging one shoulder irritably. "I already gave you my answer. Want it again?" he offered, cocking his automail hand for a punch.

"That's quite all right," Roy said dryly, feeling carefully for the bruise on his cheek. "I think your extremely protective family is taking care of that for you."

"Yeah, you think you've got it bad, you should try living with them." Ed shoved his hands into his pockets. "What do you want, Colonel?"

"You know what I want," Roy answered, rocking back on his heels. "And it's General, now."

"Oh yeah? You got promoted a few times, then," Ed said, tipping his head to the side. "Should I offer you congratulations, or a kick on the ass out the door?"

"You would have known if you had bothered to read my letters," Roy replied.

"Why should I? There's nothing in them that's of interest to me." Ed shrugged.

"If you had read them, then you would know that the situation is worsening in Drachma," Roy replied. "It's been a while since you set foot on a battlefield, but I assure you it's no prettier in the North than it was in the East. We are in desperate need of Alchemists who could help limit our casualties - save the lives of our men."

Ed's eyes narrowed, and his shoulders tensed, but he shrugged again, affecting unconcern. "Not my responsibility," he said. "My responsibilities are here."

"That's very cold, even for you, Fullmetal."

"Call me that once more and I'll knock you on your ass again, Flame," Ed said. "And maybe it is. So I can be a ruthless bastard. That's something you ought to be able to understand, at least."

Roy smiled slightly. He certainly couldn't deny that. "We are still very much alike, Edward Elric."

Ed looked up at him, meeting his eyes at last with clear uncompromising gold. "No, we aren't; not any more," he said. "And do you know why? Because I met my damn goals, that's why, and I finished with it. I put them aside and I'm done. You're still caught up in the chase. And I think you've forgotten what it is you're chasing for; I never did. I never let the means distract me from the end I was aiming to achieve. I'm not sure that you can say the same."

That stopped Roy, stopped him cold, as nothing he had heard or seen or done for a very long time had managed. He tried to find something to say, at least a flippant remark that would disguise the impact of the hit from Edward, but it was too late; the young man just shook his head, pulled his hands from his pockets, and started for the door.

He stopped in the doorway, looking back over his automail shoulder, and added, "When you've figured out just what it is you're chasing, then come and talk to me again, General."

Apparently, a country house with small children went to bed early. Roy found himself standing out in front of the the porch, tilting his head back to look up at the stars, and the house was dim and quiet behind him at an hour when the downtown sections of Central would have just been gearing up for the night. Heavy creaking sounded on the porch behind him, heralding the arrival of Armstrong.

"They are a good family," Armstrong said softly behind him, and Roy allowed himself a long sigh.

"I would have expected no less of the Elric brothers, really," Roy answered. "Those boys will succeed at whatever they put their hand to. They have the determination, and the talent, for that. That is why we need them so badly."

The porch gave off one final creak as Armstrong climbed down to stand beside him - or over him, as the case may be. "Request permission to speak freely, sir," Armstrong said.

"Go on," Roy answered, not moving. "You always have it; you know that."

"I do not doubt that Edward - and Alphonse, too, because I do not believe that he would ever let his brother go into danger without him - would be a great resource on the battlefield," Armstrong rumbled.

"However, to do so would mean destroying what they have built here. I feel, sir, that if we can so easily destroy the households that our own people build for themselves in our own country, then the military has failed, no matter how many battles it may win."

"What are you saying, Alex?" Roy asked softly. He didn't look at his old friend, instead just watching the stars. Funny; they were the same here as they were in Central, but somehow, you could see them so much more clearly from here.

"Just this. That the purpose of a military, above all else, is to protect and defend its people from dangers that might threaten from the outside. I believe that too many people have forgotten that purpose, in the pursuit of other goals. I do not believe that we should let ourselves be so distracted by our means that we should forget our ends."

After a long moment, Roy lowered his gaze to the earth again, and chuckled quietly. "You're an idealist, Alex," he said.

"Yes, sir."

"Something to protect..." Roy trailed off, staring out into the darkness. Then he shook his head, as though coming out of a reverie. "Let's go back inside, Lieutenant Colonel," he said. "We'll need to get off to an early start in the morning. I have unfortunate news to deliver to the brass."

"Yes, sir." Gravely, though hardly visible in the dim light, Armstrong saluted.

* * *

An early start turned out to be out of the question, Roy thought somewhat wryly, later. But it had certainly been an educational morning.

"Well, goodbye and good riddance, Colonel," Ed said, stifling a yawn. He made an unerring grab for the back of Peter's shirt as the boy went barreling by in a desperate bid for one last hug on 'Uncle' Armstrong. "Hope to see you around again, Major."

"Lieutenant Colonel," Al corrected him, taking Peter as Ed handed the boy over. Ed shrugged. "Right, whatever," he said, waving the distinction aside.

"Oh, you'll be seeing both of us again, soon enough," Roy said, with a faint smile.

Ed squinted at him in the morning light, and scowled. "How's that?" he said. "I thought you'd do the sensible thing and give up where you know it's hopeless."

"I'll be bringing back negative results on my report this time, it's certain," he told them. "But I have no doubt that the issue will not be resolved so easily. These things never are. I expect I will be reassigned to the investigation again. I will come back to recruit you again, Fullmetal... oh, say, the fourth of next month?"

Ed was gawping at him, expression beginning to thundercloud. Just to make it clear, Roy added in, "Please ask your lovely wife to bake that excellent pudding again. I'm sure I'll need it to console my disappointment."

Al caught it first - of course - and laughed. "Of course," he said, grinning at the pair of them. "Don't forget to bring presents, next time, or else the kids will never forgive you." He elbowed his brother in the side, earning a start and a growl, but at least Ed stopped looking like he was about to try and punch Roy out again.

Roy nodded. "Of course," he said. "Well - until next time," he said, and turned to leave.

He'd only been to Risembourg once before, but it was hard to get lost here. There was only one road out, and only one road home.

* * *

~to be continued.


	6. Epilogue: Where Are They Now?

This was written for **askerian** in response to my Timestamp/Where Are They Now meme, where people could choose a story and request to see what happens a month years later. I figured I might as well post it up as an epilogue here too.

* * *

This time, Roy came prepared. He brought a number of toys with him from the finest toyshops in Central - the same stores he had once patronized when visiting Hughes' family had been a regular part of his life. The children greeted him with excited shouts and squeals, albeit some disappointment about where "Uncle Armstrong" had gone. Their parents' greetings were more restrained, polite civility and even a hint of real pleasure mixed with wariness. But at least nobody was punching him in the head yet this visit, so Roy gave them his most charming smile, and said nothing.

They had some time to chat in the living room, polite, inconsequential things while dinner cooked and the children were busy on the floor with their new toys. Dinner itself was much as he remembered, a chaotic melee of hot steam, shrill shouting voices, sweet smells and savory food, and this time Roy was able to enjoy the meal with no reservations.

As soon as dinner was over Ed declared himself in charge of the dishes and ducked away into the kitchen. Roy had been counting on this; he quickly volunteered his own assistance in repayment for the meal and ducked into the kitchen after Ed.

"What do you want, Colonel?" Ed said warily as Roy stacked an array of non-matching plates in the sink. "You're up to something. Don't even try to tell me you're not. Didn't I make my answer clear enough the last time you came?"

General Roy Mustang ignored the slip, leaning back against the counter with his elbows propped beside his hips, and considered how to go about this. He had come prepared this time in more ways than one. "I have a job proposition that might interest you," he began.

Ed made an impatient noise. "I already told you, I'm not coming back to the military," he said curtly.

"Who said anything about re-enlisting?" Roy said mildly. "No, what I had mind was more in the nature of a civilian contract, one in research and development."

"Same damn difference!" Ed said explosively, turning on Roy with a dangerous glint in his gold eyes. "I'm not going to help the military blow people up in bigger and better ways, either! Leave me out of your dirty dealings - I don't do that shit any more!"

"What would you say," Roy began, as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a tightly folded sheaf of papers, beginning to unfold it like a newspaper. "If I told you there's a new technology in development which would target weapons instead of humans?"

Ed gave him an incredulous look and snatched the paper out of his hand. His expression changed as he read, the angry wariness giving way to an intrigued interest, and Roy pursued his advantage. "You're quite an ambitious and gifted young man, Fullmetal," he said, "and this quiet country life is peaceful enough, but it doesn't suit your energies. Reports from your friends and family seem to indicate that you're growing increasingly restless out here, trapped in the confines of this pastoral life. A challenge like this is just what you need, I think. You could really be part of something amazing."

The paper crinkled in Ed's fist. "This will never work," Ed scoffed, folding the prototype into a sloppy triangle. "The design is ridiculous. They don't know the first damn thing about energy transferrance. All this will do is blow themselves up instead of their enemies."

"Ah, but you can see the idea, can't you?" Roy said smoothly. "You're already thinking about how it could be _made_ to work. That's exactly why this team needs you, Edward. Think about it."

There was a long pause, and Roy could see Ed struggling with himself. His grip tightened, crushing the paper further. "I won't leave my kids," Ed said at last. "I _won't_ abandon them."

"Who said you had to?" Roy said hastily, tacking into this wind. He wasn't sure what exactly was driving the dangerous fire lurking in Edward's eyes, but it was always better to work around Fullmetal than to meet him head-on. "Alphonse works on alchemical theory problems my mail; why can't you do the same? You'd only have to come to Central for a few days out of a month, to oversee the test runs themselves. And have you considered," he said as Ed opened his mouth to protest again, "that you could bring your children /with/ you?"

Clearly Ed had not; he stood there with his mouth open while Roy continued, taking a step forward and laying his hand on Ed's shoulder. "It would be a good experience for them, to get out of this secluded corner of the country and see the capital. They would learn a lot, and certainly enjoy themselves. In fact, you could bring your whole family along, like a little holiday. It's all very well to stifle yourself, Edward, in pursuit of some penance or writing old wrong; but is it fair to ask them to stifle themselves, as well?"

"You're still an ass, Colonel Mustang," Ed snapped at him, shoving him backwards and brushing Roy's hand off his arm. He balled the schematic into a wad of paper, and shoved it into his pocket. "I'll think about it."

~end.


End file.
